The company soon embarked on a tour of venues in South America, Europe, and North Africa. Check out this biography to know about his childhood, family life, achievements and fun facts about him. Her fieldwork inspired her innovative interpretations of dance in the Caribbean, South America, and Africa. 7 Katherine Dunham facts. [14] Redfield, Herskovits, and Sapir's contributions to cultural anthropology, exposed Dunham to topics and ideas that inspired her creatively and professionally. By Renata Sago. "In introducing authentic African dance-movements to her company and audiences, Dunhamperhaps more than any other choreographer of the timeexploded the possibilities of modern dance expression.". Much of the literature calls upon researchers to go beyond bureaucratic protocols to protect communities from harm, but rather use their research to benefit communities that they work with. Dunham and her company appeared in the Hollywood movie Casbah (1948) with Tony Martin, Yvonne De Carlo, and Peter Lorre, and in the Italian film Botta e Risposta, produced by Dino de Laurentiis. Katherine Dunham: The Artist as Activist During World War II. Katherine Johnson graduated from college at age 18. Dancer, anthropologist, social worker, activist, author. Throughout her career, Dunham occasionally published articles about her anthropological research (sometimes under the pseudonym of Kaye Dunn) and sometimes lectured on anthropological topics at universities and scholarly societies.[27]. Video footage of Dunham technique classes show a strong emphasis on anatomical alignment, breath, and fluidity. Her dance company was provided with rent-free studio space for three years by an admirer and patron, Lee Shubert; it had an initial enrollment of 350 students. While trying to help the young people in the community, Dunham was arrested. : Writings by and About Katherine Dunham. Dunham was always a formidable advocate for racial equality, boycotting segregated venues in the United States and using her performances to highlight discrimination. In September 1943, under the management of the impresario Sol Hurok, her troupe opened in Tropical Review at the Martin Beck Theater. Childhood & Early Life. [41] The State Department was dismayed by the negative view of American society that the ballet presented to foreign audiences. [54] This wave continued throughout the 1990s with scholars publishing works (such as Decolonizing Anthropology: Moving Further in Anthropology for Liberation,[55] Decolonizing Methodologies,[56] and more recently, The Case for Letting Anthropology Burn[57]) that critique anthropology and the discipline's roles in colonial knowledge production and power structures. Receiving a post graduate academic fellowship, she went to the Caribbean to study the African diaspora, ethnography and local dance. On February 22, 2022, Selkirk will offer a unique, one-lot auction titled, Divine Technique: Katherine Dunham Ephemera And Documents. In 1967 she officially retired, after presenting a final show at the famous Apollo Theater in Harlem, New York. Example. Long, Richard A, and Joe Nash. Tropics (choreographed 1937) and Le Jazz Hot (1938) were among the earliest of many works based on her research. Omissions? Dunham was active in human rights causes, and in 1992 she staged a 47-day hunger strike to highlight the plight of Haitian refugees. until hia death in the 1986. In 1937 she traveled with them to New York to take part in A Negro Dance Evening, organized by Edna Guy at the 92nd Street YMHA. Classes are led by Ruby Streate, director of dance and education and artistic director of the Katherine Dunham Children's Workshop. Having completed her undergraduate work at the University of Chicago and decided to pursue a performing career rather than academic studies, Dunham revived her dance ensemble. Here are some interesting facts about Alvin Ailey for you: Facts about Alvin Ailey 1: the popular modern dance In response, the Afonso Arinos law was passed in 1951 that made racial discrimination in public places a felony in Brazil.[42][43][44][45][46][47]. "My job", she said, "is to create a useful legacy. Legendary dancer, choreographer and anthropologist Katherine Dunham was born June 22, 1909, to an African American father and French-Canadian mother who died when she was young. Dunhams writings, sometimes published under the pseudonym Kaye Dunn, include Katherine Dunhams Journey to Accompong (1946), an account of her anthropological studies in Jamaica; A Touch of Innocence (1959), an autobiography; Island Possessed (1969); and several articles for popular and scholarly journals. Katherine Dunham (born June 22, 1909) [1] [2] was an American dancer, choreographer, and anthropologist. In 1964, Dunham settled in East St. Louis, and took up the post of artist-in-residence at Southern Illinois University in nearby Edwardsville. ", Black writer Arthur Todd described her as "one of our national treasures". The Katherine Dunham Company toured throughout North America in the mid-1940s, performing as well in the racially segregated South. She choreographed for Broadway stage productions and operaincluding Aida (1963) for the New York Metropolitan Opera. There she met John Pratt, an artist and designer and they got married in 1941 until his death in 1986. Biography. She and her company frequently had difficulties finding adequate accommodations while on tour because in many regions of the country, black Americans were not allowed to stay at hotels. Katherine Dunham. Although Dunham was offered another grant from the Rockefeller Foundation to pursue her academic studies, she chose dance. [17] She was one of the first African-American women to attend this college and to earn these degrees. At the time, the South Side of Chicago was experiencing the effects of the Great Migration were Black southerners attempted to escape the Jim Crow South and poverty. The group performed Dunham's Negro Rhapsody at the Chicago Beaux Arts Ball. Barrelhouse. The State Department regularly subsidized other less well-known groups, but it consistently refused to support her company (even when it was entertaining U.S. Army troops), although at the same time it did not hesitate to take credit for them as "unofficial artistic and cultural representatives". She majored in anthropology at the University of Chicago, and after learning that much of Black . She was a pioneer of Dance Anthropology, established methodologies of ethnochoreology, and her work gives essential historical context to current conversations and practices of decolonization within and outside of the discipline of anthropology. Katherine Dunham. It was a huge collection of writings by and about Katherine Dunham, so it naturally covered a lot of area. As a student, she studied under anthropologists such as A.R. Katherine Dunham (1909-2006) brought African dance aesthetics to the United States, forever influencing modern and jazz dance. [1] The Dunham Technique is still taught today. They had particular success in Denmark and France. katherine dunham fun factsaiken county sc register of deeds katherine dunham fun facts Using some ballet vernacular, Dunham incorporates these principles into a set of class exercises she labeled as "processions". Other movies she performed in as a dancer during this period included the Abbott and Costello comedy Pardon My Sarong (1942) and the black musical Stormy Weather (1943), which featured a stellar range of actors, musicians and dancers.[24]. Her dance career was interrupted in 1935 when she received funding from the Rosenwald Foundation which allowed her to travel to Jamaica, Martinique, Trinidad, and Haiti for eighteen months to explore each country's respective dance cultures. Many of Dunham students who attended free public classes in East St. Louis Illinois speak highly about the influence of her open technique classes and artistic presence in the city. In 1966, she served as a State Department representative for the United States to the first ever World Festival of Negro Arts in Dakar, Senegal. Named Marie-Christine Dunham Pratt, she was their only child. She is a celebrity dancer. As a choreographer, anthropologist, educator, and activist, Katherine Dunham transformed the field of dance in the twentieth century. Katherine Dunham was an African-American dancer and choreographer, producer, author, scholar, anthropologist and Civil Rights activist. Dunham accepted a position at Southern Illinois University in East St. Louis in the 1960s. Dunham was born in Chicago on June 22, 1909. You dance because you have to. This gained international headlines and the embarrassed local police officials quickly released her. In 1949, Dunham returned from international touring with her company for a brief stay in the United States, where she suffered a temporary nervous breakdown after the premature death of her beloved brother Albert. 47 Copy quote. The school was managed in Dunham's absence by Syvilla Fort, one of her dancers, and thrived for about 10 years. Born in Glen Ellyn, IL #6. Featuring lively Latin American and Caribbean dances, plantation dances, and American social dances, the show was an immediate success. Dunham became interested in both writing and dance at a young age. Artists are necessary to social justice movements; they are the ones who possess a gift to see beyond the bleak present and imagine a better future. Writings by and about Katherine Dunham" , Katherine Dunham, 2005. Birth City: Decatur. Legendary dancer, choreographer and anthropologist Katherine Dunham was born June 22, 1909, to an African American father and French-Canadian mother who died when she was young. Keep reading for more such interesting quotes at Kidadl!) Such visitors included ethnomusicologist Alan Lomax, novelist and anthropologist Zora Neale Hurston, Robert Redfield, Bronisaw Malinowski, A.R. Her world-renowned modern dance company exposed audiences to the diversity of dance, and her schools brought dance training and education to a variety of populations sharing her passion and commitment to dance as a medium of cultural communication. For almost 30 years she maintained the Katherine Dunham Dance Company, the only self-supported American black dance troupe at that time. Please scroll down to enjoy more supporting materials. Alvin Ailey, who stated that he first became interested in dance as a professional career after having seen a performance of the Katherine Dunham Company as a young teenager of 14 in Los Angeles, called the Dunham Technique "the closest thing to a unified Afro-American dance existing.". ", Examples include: The Ballet in film "Stormy Weather" (Stone 1943) and "Mambo" (Rossen 1954). June 22 Dancer #4. ", Richard Buckle, ballet historian and critic, wrote: "Her company of magnificent dancers and musicians met with the success it has and that herself as explorer, thinker, inventor, organizer, and dancer should have reached a place in the estimation of the world, has done more than a million pamphlets could for the service of her people. The living Dunham tradition has persisted. Katherine Dunham or the "Matriarch of Black Dance'' as many called her, was a revolutionary African American anthropologist and professional dancer. This concert, billed as Tropics and Le Hot Jazz, included not only her favorite partners Archie Savage and Talley Beatty, but her principal Haitian drummer, Papa Augustin. As a dancer and choreographer, Katherine Dunham (1910-2002) wowed audiences in the 1930s and 1940s when she combined classical ballet with African rhythms to create an exciting new dance style. She . The Dunham troupe toured for two decades, stirring audiences around the globe with their dynamic and highly theatrical performances. In 1940, she formed the Katherine Dunham Dance Company, which became the premier facility for training dancers. 2 (2020): 259271. [4], Katherine Mary Dunham was born on 22 June 1909 in a Chicago hospital. [35] In a different interview, Dunham describes her technique "as a way of life,[36]" a sentiment that seems to be shared by many of her admiring students. Not only did Dunham shed light on the cultural value of black dance, but she clearly contributed to changing perceptions of blacks in America by showing society that as a black woman, she could be an intelligent scholar, a beautiful dancer, and a skilled choreographer. 3 (1992): 24. In 1950, Sol Hurok presented Katherine Dunham and Her Company in a dance revue at the Broadway Theater in New York, with a program composed of some of Dunham's best works. Katherine Dunham in 1956. It was not a success, closing after only eight performances. As a graduate student in anthropology in the mid-1930s, she conducted dance research in the Caribbean. Katherine Dunham, was published in a limited, numbered edition of 130 copies by the Institute for the Study of Social Change. Dunham created Rara Tonga and Woman with a Cigar at this time, which became well known. [15] He showed her the connection between dance and social life giving her the momentum to explore a new area of anthropology, which she later termed "Dance Anthropology". "Katherine Dunham's Dance as Public Anthropology." Initially scheduled for a single performance, the show was so popular that the troupe repeated it for another ten Sundays. He needn't have bothered. April 30, 2019. Retrieved from the Library of Congress,
. Katherine Dunham in a photograph from around 1945. Over her long career, she choreographed more than ninety individual dances. [15], In 1935, Dunham was awarded travel fellowships from the Julius Rosenwald and Guggenheim foundations to conduct ethnographic fieldwork in Haiti, Jamaica, Martinique, and Trinidad studying the dance forms of the Caribbean. Later in the year she opened a cabaret show in Las Vegas, during the first year that the city became a popular entertainment as well as gambling destination. Kaiso is an Afro-Caribbean term denoting praise. She felt it was necessary to use the knowledge she gained in her research to acknowledge that Africanist esthetics are significant to the cultural equation in American dance. Short Biography. [58] Early on into graduate school, Dunham was forced to choose between finishing her master's degree in anthropology and pursuing her career in dance. The highly respected Dance magazine did a feature cover story on Dunham in August 2000 entitled "One-Woman Revolution". Dunham had one of the most successful dance careers in American and European theater of the 20th century, and directed her own dance company for many years. London: Zed Books, 1999. Her legacy was far-reaching, both in dance and her cultural and social work. At the recommendation of her mentor Melville Herskovits, PhB'20a Northwestern University anthropologist and African studies expertDunham's calling cards read both "dancer" and . Beautiful, Justice, Black. In her biography, Joyce Aschenbrenner (2002), credits Ms Dunham as the "matriarch and queen mother of black dance", and describes her work as: "fundamentally . Search input Search submit button. It was a venue for Dunham to teach young black dancers about their African heritage. "Her mastery of body movement was considered 'phenomenal.' Example. She was born on June 22, 1909 in Glen Ellyn, Illinois, a small . [54] Her dance education, while offering cultural resources for dealing with the consequences and realities of living in a racist environment, also brought about feelings of hope and dignity for inspiring her students to contribute positively to their own communities, and spreading essential cultural and spiritual capital within the U.S.[54], Just like her colleague Zora Neale Hurston, Dunham's anthropology inspired the blurring of lines between creative disciplines and anthropology. [6][10] While still a high school student, she opened a private dance school for young black children. Her fieldwork inspired her innovative interpretations of dance in the Caribbean, South America, and Africa. Through her ballet teachers, she was also exposed to Spanish, East Indian, Javanese, and Balinese dance forms.[23]. She established the Katherine Dunham Centers for Arts and Humanities in East St. Louis to preserve Haitian and African instruments and artifacts from her personal collection.
Estimate The Heat Of Combustion For One Mole Of Acetylene,
Ilrc Quick Reference Chart 2020,
Glendale Dmv Driving Test Route,
Madelyn Grace Car Accident,
Articles K