The thesis constitutes an examination of contemporary dance in the 1990s in Greece as exemplified in the case of three dance companies - SineQuaNon, Oktana Dancetheatre and Edafos Company – major exponents of the bourgeoning dance scene of that time. The focus is on a particular historical moment, the year 1995, and on three choreographies – ProsOlotoixos [Tour de Force] by Apostolia Papadamaki (SineQuaNon), Daphnis and Chloe by Konstantinos Rigos (Oktana Dancetheatre) and Enos Leptou Sigy [One Moment of Silence] by Dimitris Papaioannou (Edafos Company) - as indications of the vitality of contemporary dance of the times which caused major changes in dance policy. The main hypothesis is that contemporary dance of the 1990s became a site where ideas of change and renewal, pertinent in social milieu became embodied, but at the same time, the companies proposed alternative notions of community, cosmopolitanism and gay identities. The three cases reveal the complex interplay between dance and its social, political and historical context, centering on processes of modernisation of the country and cultural discourses. The thesis explores the emergence of a new generation of artists who negotiated and captured aspects and tensions of the process of modernisation and connected their practices to new artistic identities in accordance with the changing context. The research has been influenced by recent efforts outside Greece to re-examine dance in its social, historical and economic context and to bring the body into historical and contemporary analyses of culture. This methodology highlights the web of power within which contemporary dance was involved, and following post-structuralist critique of history, examines dance history, not as a linear progressive development but through a re-negotiation of power balances between discourses, bodies and institutions.