CAREER ESSAY

Career Essay (on dancing)

Career Essay (on dancing)

Introduction

Dancers utilise a variety of dance forms, including classical ballet and modern dance styles that allow free movement and self-expression (Manning, 1997). Many dancers combine stage work with teaching or choreography. Dancers perform in a variety of settings such as musical productions (Aschengreen, 1974); in folk, ethnic, tap, jazz; and other popular kinds of dancing. They also perform in opera, musical comedy, television, movies, music videos, and commercials in which they may sing and act as well. Dancers most often perform as part of a group, although a few top artists perform solo. Whether I study dance at a college, university, or conservatory, be prepared for an intense experience. At many institutions, students can chose between a Bachelor of Arts in dance and a Bachelor of Fine Arts in dance; these degrees and their requirements may vary depending where I decide to study.

Colleges and universities will provide me with opportunities to perform and gain experience outside of the classroom. Many schools offer dance ensembles or troupes that give us the opportunity to perform in front of a variety of audiences and with dancers—including other students, faculty, and alumni—who have varied skill levels. Obtaining a degree in dance provides you with a variety of options for future careers. Many graduates work as professional dancers, teachers, choreographers, dance therapists, arts administrators, dance notators, and more. Focusing on technique, choreography, dance history, and pedagogy, a degree in dance can prepare to pursue a career as a performer, a choreographer, or a teacher.

On the other hand, dancers and choreographers face intense competition for jobs (Foster, 1996). The number of male applicants like me continues to grow, and only the most talented dancers will find regular employment. Male dancers perform in productions such as professional dance companies, musical productions, television, movies, videos, commercials, and more.

Historical Perspective

Although individual men had certainly done so in the past, the forerunners served as an entire cohort in breaking the rules, both of their art form and of cultural norms for men, by claiming (if not always realising) liberty for the male dancing body-freedom from corsets and shoes; freedom to create new expressive vocabularies of movement. Yet these men, and many other, famous choreographers of their generation-like the French Marius Petipa and the Russian Vaslav Nijinsky, who gave trainings to others.

Although these early dominant figures brought changes in the political or cultural sphere. Male dancers created an alternative market and largely male and female audiences for dance performances, outside of the male-dominated opera-house ballet stage and popular entertainments. When they put their bodies, their emotions, and their imaginations centre stage, these aspects of the particular selves they projected, while not essentially female, nevertheless were marked as bodies, emotions, and imaginations of men. That the next generation of choreographers-both European and American-further promoted the identification of modern dance as a ripe field for male creative artists (choreographers, that is, as opposed to dancers) and effectively relinquished ballet to the male choreographers, suggests two ...