A line of five Asian American dancers, each wearing a tutu, kicking out their left legs as they perform the can-can at the Forbidden City nightclub in San Francisco, California, circa 1945.

Americanism, Exoticism, and the “Chop Suey” Circuit

Asian American artists who performed for primarily white audiences in the 1930s and ’40s both challenged and solidified racial boundaries in the United States.
Loie Fuller

The Serpentine Career of Loïe Fuller

Rising from the ranks of touring comedies and Wild West shows, the American dancer dreamed of a future of light, movement, and metamorphosis.
Martha Graham

Martha Graham’s Night Journey

Reinterpreting the Greek tragedy, Graham built a choreography of dramatic, angular movements to embody the female experience, past and present.
Young adults dance the Bossa Nova and the Twist during a dance contest with Ray Milan and the Quartet in Los Angeles,California, 1964

The Bossa Nova Craze

In the early 1960s, bossa nova was hugely popular in the US thanks to its reinvention as a social dance and its connections with upper-class culture.
Onlookers watch as people dance at a memorial site for George Floyd outside Cup Foods June 5, 2020 in Minneapolis, Minnesota

What is Dance Activism?

An aesthetic of resistance and a form of protest against racist ideologies, dance activism has become a meaningful part of the Black Lives Matter movement.
Dance marathon, April 20, 1923

Dance Marathons

In the early twentieth century, dance marathons were an entire industry—and a surprisingly hazardous business.
Two devadesis in Chennai, India, in the 1920s.

How South Asian Temple Dancers Fought Moral Reform

Devadāsīs appealed to a longstanding tradition to argue that they had a legitimate position in their modernizing nation.
A poster for Tango!, 1933

How Women Singers Subverted Tango’s Masculinity

In the hands of performers known as cancionistas, the genre known for its machismo was transformed.
Yvonne Rainer

Yvonne Rainer, Postmodern Dance, and You

In the 1960s, a group of artists started experimenting with choreography based on ordinary movement and improvisation. Now your living room is the stage.
Kathak

Indian Classical Dance and the Power of “Oneness”

Kathak is a classical form of Indian dance. Its practitioners use movement and gesture to tell stories, transcending gender and selfhood.