Bob Fosse's choreography endows women with agency and self-confidence. He explores female sexuality and empowers women through his use of androgyny, glamour, fetishism, and the urban aesthetic. In his stage and film choreographic structures, Fosse cedes independence to women giving female performers and female viewers a chance to celebrate power without sacrificing their femininity. The most compelling aspect of his work is the appreciation of feminine traits combined with the appropriation of fetishized objects that give women authority. Unlike more traditional schools of feminist and male gaze theory, which consider emphasis on female sexual display an necessarily exploitative and objectifying, "glam-femme" theory asserts that women are empowered through glorification of glamour and the sex appeal associated with it. / A Thesis Submitted to the Department of Dance in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Master of Arts. / Spring Semester, 2003. / April 21, 2003. / Bob Fosse's Choreography / Includes bibliographical references. / Sally R. Sommer, Professor Directing Thesis; Tricia Henry Young, Committee Member; John O. Perpener, III, Committee Member.

Evolution of the American performance culture between 1850-1910 was deeply rooted within broad social and cultural changes. Harriet Beecher Stowe, Mark Twain, and Henry James engage the reflective quality of performance culture to interrogate these social and cultural changes and to address their place in an increasingly diverse America. In this paper, I discuss the elements of performance culture, specifically dance scenes, which these authors write to draw the readers' attention to American identity issues. These scenes expose the authors' apprehension and resistance toward changes in the stereotypical American identity. I argue that James is less able to compromise his portrait of the ideal American than Stowe and Twain, which explains his abandonment of the exploration of human consciousness in favor of inanimate objects in his 1907 travel novel, The American Scene. / A Thesis submitted to the Department of English in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts. / Spring Semester, 2004. / April 1, 2004. / Etiquette, Minstrelsy, Waltz, Blackface, Layering / Includes bibliographical references. / W. T. Lhamon, Jr., Professor Directing Thesis; Dennis Moore, Committee Member; Barry Faulk, Committee Member.

This study provides an analytical exploration of the embodied performance of Italian-American ethnicity in film. The analyzed performances are taken from The Godfather trilogy, Moonstruck, and Saturday Night Fever. These films provide a wide range of characters expertly portrayed by the actors and directors. The purpose of this study is to illuminate the inherent presence of dance and movement in expressing ethnicity in filmic performances. This project utilizes movement analysis, cultural studies, gender studies and ethnicity studies to address the importance of the performer's body in expressing character, gender and ethnicity. American folklore or mythology is largely created by the medium of film and many of these mythological characters are part of the hyphenated ethnicities that form our culture. The seminal performances found in The Godfather trilogy, Moonstruck, and Saturday Night Fever brought several Italian-American character types to mythological proportions. The movement of these character types as individuals and in ensembles, as well as the films' mise en scene forms the primary focus of this analysis. This project also allies the inherently intertwined relationship between acting and dancing. Analyzing these performances as choreographic as well as dramatic broadens the scope of dance studies to include other bodily performances. A brief introduction and outline of this study begins the text of this thesis. This introduction elucidates the dance perspective given to the filmic analysis. The first chapter provides a brief history of Italians in America in the twentieth century. The following chapters contain an overview of the character types to be discussed, movement analysis of these characters as individuals, ensemble movement and the narrative venues for these portrayals of ethnicity. Finally a concluding chapter will tie together the overarching ideas of this project and consider future possibilities for this approach to performance studies. / A Thesis submitted to the Department of Dance in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts. / Summer Semester, 2004. / April 9, 2004. / Ethnicity, Performance, Film, Dance, Italian-American, Cultural Movement Systems / Includes bibliographical references. / Tricia Henry Young, Professor Directing Thesis; John O. Perpener, Committee Member; Sally Sommer, Committee Member.

This thesis investigates ritual expressions of heritage and identity within a dance community, American Team Clogging. The scope of this thesis includes competitive team clogging which emerged through a spontaneous fusion of regional "big set" square dancing and improvised percussive footwork (otherwise performed solo) during a square dance competition at Asheville, North Carolina's Mountain Dance and Folk Festival in 1928 (originally known as the Rhododendron Festival). This study reveals how Appalachian heritage, especially Western North Carolina (WNC) "folk" dance, is accessed and interpreted through team clogging on local,regional, and national levels in the United States. Using Victor (and Edith) Turner's theories on communitas, ritual performance, and pilgrimage, this thesis demonstrates the function of team clogging, and its pilgrimage systems maintained through a network of sanctioned clogging competitions known as American Clogging Hall of Fame, in leveling differences of participants—diverse in expression of ethnic and religious heritage and/or identity. Through clogging rituals, team cloggers are united in communitas, the greatest width of commonality. This thesis demonstrates how unity is generated and maintained among diverse participants through interpretation of symbols, rituals, and myth in this American dance culture. This thesis demonstrates that diverse cloggers literally clog away their differences. / A Thesis submitted to the Department of Dance in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts. / Spring Semester, 2009. / March 30, 2009. / Mountain Dance and Folk Festival, Dance, Appalachian Studies, Bascom Lamar Lunsford, Western North Carolina, American Heritage, Folk Dancing, Dance Competitions, Folk Festivals, Authenticity, Clogging, Square Dancing, Tourism, Victor Turner, Pilgrimage, Asheville, American Clogging Hall of Fame, Protestantism, Ritual Process, Communitas, Southern Studies / Includes bibliographical references. / Tricia Young, Professor Directing Thesis; Jennifer Atkins, Committee Member; Patricia Phillips, Committee Member.

This thesis examines the evolution of dance works by two Japanese-American choreographers, Eiko and Koma. Growing up in the politically turbulent 1960s in Japan, their entrance into the world of dance was motivated by philosophical inquiry into Japanese society. Briefly trained under early Butoh pioneers in Japan, they traveled from Japan to Europe, and eventually came to the U.S. Their dance career began in the early 1970s and continues to this day. Using Janet Wolff's concept of art as an expression of artist's Lebenswelt, this thesis defines Eiko and Koma's dance works as a comprehensive expression. Lebenswelt is not limited to representation of particular life experiences. Instead the artists' participation in different social contexts shapes the subjective meanings of the art they create. I chose five works, White Dance: Moth, Grain, Lament, Land, and Cambodian Stories as the signature representations of different phases in their career. These five works reveal common threads which both represent Eiko and Koma's aesthetics as well as encapsulate their philosophy towards dance and, on the greater scale, towards life. This thesis serves as one of the first scholarly research papers focusing on Eiko and Koma and their dance forms. It is the hope of this author that the thesis provides the groundwork from which other scholarly research is conducted. / A Thesis submitted to the Department of Dance in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts. / Summer Semester, 2009. / October 18, 2007. / Eiko, Koma, Dance, Performance, Performing, Japanese, Japan, Art, History, Post-war, Butoh, Contemporary Dance, Modern Dance, Experimental, 1960s, 1970s, Movement, Fine Art / Includes bibliographical references. / Sally R. Sommer, Professor Directing Thesis; Tricia H. Young, Committee Member; John O. Perpener, III, Committee Member.

The gestural language of a hip hop dance battle is one of the most important elements of the form. This study's primary focus is the gestural language of 'burns' used in battles by women hip hop dancers. Burns, the specific gestural language in battling used to insult the opponent, will be analyzed through several theoretical points of view such as feminism, queer theory, and historiography to name a few. These theories will be used to trace the evolution of women burns from the 1970s in New York City to today's contemporary bgirls. The masculinized/sexualized forms of battle behaviors have shaped the physical expression of the women. However, this gestural language has evolved from the transformative to the repressive affecting the bgirl psyche in many ways, becoming both empowering and disempowering. I will question why there exist few potent female-centered gestures in the women's burns, and how empowerment might be gained through bgirls using their own sexual/reproductive gestures in battling. / A Thesis submitted to the School of Dance in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts. / Spring Semester, 2010. / December 6, 2010. / Includes bibliographical references. / Sally R. Sommer, Professor Directing Thesis; Tricia Young, Committee Member; Rick McCullough, Committee Member; Jennifer Atkins, Committee Member.

Includes bibliographical references. / The dancers of Nyanga have taken note of the extent to which modernity has caused them to adjust and transform the movement quality and execution of their dances to create new urban African social dances. In addition, the urban dancers' experiences in the field have affected and influenced their craft. These perspectives have served as a point of departure for a re-evaluation of the role and predicaments of African social traditional dance in an urban environment, with specific reference to Nyanga township and raises questions around the manner in which modern agencies such as Christianity, education, multimedia, fashion and geography influence South African social traditional dance.

Includes abstract. / This dissertation uses Mason Durie's Te Whare Tapa Wha (the house of four sides) model of health to examine the benefits of participating in dance. Durie's (1994) model is widely used and taught throughout Aotearoa New Zealand as a guide for discussions and practices involving total health and wellbeing. The four sides of the house are: taha wairua, the spiritual aspect of health; taha whānau, social aspect; taha hinengaro, mental and emotional aspect; and taha tinana, the physical aspect; each of which will be applied to circumstances, situations, and phenomena found in dance. Each aspect of health, although they stand alone in their own right, is interconnected with, and relies on the other. Dance is a place to explore, understand, and come to know oneself and others in each aspect of health; as dance is a holistically healthy activity which empowers an individual in life, as it reflects and amplifies issues, perceptions, and ideas, and is a place to explore those issues. Dance enhances the sense of spirituality and connection to one's self, others, and the environment. This occurs through muscular bonding, use of the shared breath, and the feeling of connectedness between people when honouring and embodying one's ancestors and history through movement. The dance community can also be a surrogate family, through developing how one builds and maintains relationships by building rapport, caring for others, and creating a sense of belonging within the group. Dance improves the ability to think through the body, and is a site for physically maintaining and improving the body.

Includes abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 130-142).

Includes abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 109-119).