Researching Dance: Evolving Modes of Inquiry

by Sondra Fraleigh (Editor), Penelope Hanstein (Editor)

In Researching Dance , an introduction to research methods in dance addressed primarily to graduate students, the editors explore dance as evolutional, defining it in view of its intrinsic participatory values, its developmental aspects, and its purposes from art to ritual, and they examine the role of theory in research. The editors have also included essays by nine dancer-scholars who examine qualitative and quantitative inquiry and delineate the most common approaches for investigating dance, raising concerns about philosophy and aesthetics, historical scholarship, movement analysis, sexual and gender identification, cultural diversity, and the resources available to students. The writers have included study questions, research exercises, and suggested readings to facilitate the book’s use as a classroom text.

Genres: School, Nonfiction

384 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1998

About the author

Sondra Fraleigh is founding director of the Eastwest Somatic Institute for Dance and Movement Studies and the author of six books on dance and movement philosophy published by university presses. She is professor of dance emeritus, and chaired the Department of Dance at the State University of New York at Brockport for nine years, later directing the graduate dance program there. Fraleigh is certified in the Feldenkrais Method of Somatic Education. She has also been an elected Faculty Exchange Scholar for the State University of New York. Fraleigh is ERYT with Yoga Alliance, Experienced Registered Yoga Teacher at the advanced 500-hour level. She teaches yoga, depth-movement dance, and somatic workshops at several locations in the United States, Europe, Japan, and New Zealand. Fraleigh’s home and that of Eastwest Somatics is in the beautiful Red Rock country of Southwest Utah.