Temple dance department celebrates a milestone and holds many celebrations to continue this program.
50 years ago, on April 25, 1975, Temple University expanded its performing arts department by including accreditation of dance into its programs. From that moment on, high school students have come to Temple with the opportunity to earn a bachelor’s, master’s, or doctorate degree in Dance.
Dance courses have been offered at Temple University since the 1910s, but dance was never fully recognized as a higher education until the 1970s. With Temple being the first higher education to add dance into their accredited curriculum in Pennsylvania, other colleges and universities started to follow suit.
The dance program has expanded to include so many genres of dance that not many other universities teach, with the hope of expanding students’ knowledge in specific styles. African Diasporic Dance Traditions, Global Ballet, Somatic Dance, Neo-Traditional West African Dance, and Post-Judson are some of the unique classes that are offered.
Lily Santana, a junior dance major, is extremely grateful for being taught these non-traditional styles of dance because she gets experience in all styles, which makes her more prepared for the industry.
“Learning multiple styles of dance helps you be well-rounded and you gain the ability to adapt to different styles in auditions. My mentor even said that the more versatile you are the better,” Santana said.
The dance department, for many years, has had a goal where they help expand the knowledge of the dance world for all of their students. The program is not just about learning a two-and-a-half-minute dance, but it is about teaching the importance of using what you have and applying it to help out in the real world. The importance of learning these styles is because they all coincide in one way or another.
“We get to incorporate all these styles and techniques that we have under our belt already, and you get a lot of your creativity from all these classes,” said senior dance major Mia Allison.
By learning these interesting and unique styles, students help showcase the culture and traditions that are involved and woven within them. They learn how to teach kids about dance, and how the art is not just about tricks and ‘wow’ moments, but about telling stories and bringing light to topics that don’t normally get the spotlight. Students are able to express themselves in ways that not many people can, and that is one reason why dance brings so much joy to people.
“Dance majors at Temple take theory courses such as Making Meaning in Dance, which focuses on dance criticism and movement analysis,” Santana stated.
The students in the dance program learn how to work as a team, but also stand out individually. Professors help expand the creativity of the students and widen their prospects of teaching dance to others, including themselves. By broadening students’ horizons of different styles of dance, they are exposed to things that students might think they won’t enjoy.
“I appreciate the creativity and freedom that we are allowed in our improvisation classes,” Allison said.
To celebrate this big achievement of 50 years, Boyer College of Music and Dance put on a show on Sept. 6 and 7 where Alumni, past and current faculty, came to perform pieces at Tomlinson Theater. They also held workshops, talks, and events that will continue on throughout the school year. The love and support that the dance program is receiving has helped spread the love and joy of dancing to everybody.
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