48. Embodied Storytelling - learning from inside the work

Artist Talk

Below is an excerpt from my master's essay; an introduction to the study and research that has guided my work for the past few years. I'm so excited be partnering with Bulkspace on Thursday, 5/1/25, not only to share my thoughts, ideas, and visions for the future, but also to build, assemble, integrate, and celebrate an artistic community. Whether you consider yourself an artist of not, we do hope you'll join us if you can!

An Introduction...

I am a dance artist, student, performer, and educator who has spent the better part of my life aspiring to an ideal: a commitment to the heritage of ballet as evidence of my value. As a child in an entertainment family and a Detroit-native, my movement practice started with Motown medleys at state fairs, bowling alleys, and corporate backyard parties. My experience was also steeped in the rich traditions of the West African and Afro-Cuban communities. Bare feet on hot pavement, dance studios, and gym floors across the city would become the heartbeat at the center of my movement dialect along with other influences from the 90’s and 2000’s like Janet Jackson, Paula Abdul, and The Fly Girls. When I moved out of the city, I was introduced to new styles and functions of dance as I learned to perform ballet as the catalyst to more “serious dance study.” I would spend the next 15 years layering on this movement vocabulary until my own native tongue was no longer decipherable.

After completing an undergraduate dance program, I developed a practice of educating young dancers in this same tradition at a private-sector dance studio providing lessons in ballet and jazz to many Black and Brown dancers from the metropolitan area. But in 2019, a whirlwind of experiences uprooted me from my routine ways of teaching and art-making to a more critical way of thinking, discovering, and knowing. I noticed that the passionate dancers I had once taught in class were now dancers ready to learn, but unable to tap into the movement through their emotion and intention. What was keeping my students from being able to sing out their stories through their movement?

A new teaching position presented me with the opportunity to analyze the ballet and jazz

traditions I was teaching as I built curricula for academic credit. Teaching for understanding instead of for the final product created space for me to wonder: how do I find myself in this movement? To do that, I had to first dig for the stories of these traditions, then locate myself within them. While reflecting on each part of my pedagogy, choreography, and performance, I found the most understanding when I recognized each to be deeply informed and ultimately shaped by my own personal experiences in relationship with the world around me. What memories did I have that aligned directly with the backstory of each of these forms? Perhaps it was my adolescent need for a distinct “right” and “wrong” fed by the ever-looming feeling of inadequacy that seemed to be embedded in the ballet practice. “Pull up!” “Turn out!” “Hold that balance!” At age 15, I was a latecomer to the tradition. The oldest girl in the class (and the only student of color), I felt that I had transcended my caste each time I was able to imitate the historically aristocratic moves to the satisfaction of my teacher. In this way, my proximity to whiteness took me out of the slums that my mother tongue relegated me to. Or perhaps it was the feeling of reunion in jazz, tap, and African classes as I was encouraged to sit in the pocket of a good rhythm, find the groove, and just let go. It wasn’t until I began to explore the stories behind these forms that I was able to recall and investigate my own connections to them, and use those connections to infuse intention into my practices moving forward.

My goal for this autoethnography is to examine my pedagogical practices, identifying areas

around which more intention could be built to support critical thinking for all participants of an

artistic experience. Much of the education I received both in dance and academic spaces relied heavily on what philosopher and radical educator Paulo Freire coined as “the banking method,” in which the instructor is the sole holder of knowledge, and the students are merely vessels into which that knowledge is poured (Freire,1968). As a young girl, I would watch my teachers at the front of the room and try my best to quell my individuality; taking my body to the technique instead of taking the technique into my body. High value was placed on skill acquisition at the expense of personal exploration. As students, we were assessed on our ability to replicate what we had been shown. We had not learned, however, how to use these dance forms in their fullness as tools that would intersect with our existing body stories to allow for a personalized understanding of how to use the forms in service to the stories being told.

To explore these lessons from the context of our own lived experiences would mean to reflect on how our experiences impacted the lessons, and determine what that meant for us and the world we live in. My hope for this autoethnography is to introduce participants to tools and ideas that clear room for them to do this work on their own, in any environment, and to identify consistent practices that support this holistic way of knowing.

(Williams, 2025)