Contemporary Choreography

Fully revised and updated, this third edition of Contemporary Choreography presents a range of articles covering choreographic enquiry, investigation into creative processes, and innovative challenges to understandings about dance making.

Jo Butterworth was previously Professor of Dance Studies at the University of Malta. Vicky Hunter is a practitioner-researcher and Visiting Research Fellow in Site Dance at Bath Spa University, UK.

General Introduction: Studying contemporary choreography Section 1. Processes of Making Section Introduction 1. Choreography through a Somatic Lens 2. Dancing identities: How dancers' embodied knowledge underscores creative methods in contemporary dancemaking 3. 'Finding the light': Curiosity, texts and contemporary ballet in Helen Pickett's The Crucible (2019) 4. "If you don't keep it open, you close": Crystal Pite and Jonathon Young's Betroffenheit (2017) and the emotional and psychological implications of theatre dance 5. Creating Future Memories, NOW: FORWARD DANCE COMPANY by LOFFT - DAS THEATER and the reimagining of disability, diversity, and cultural memory Section 2. Culture, Contexts and Intersections Section Introduction 6. Maybe You Could Close Your Eyes While I Dance: Age, Ageing, and in/visibility as choreographic drivers in Acting our Age 7. Recomposing Thai Dance for Today's World: Three Modes of Contemporary Choreographic Practice 8. Gaga's Aspirational Politics: Passepartout Bodies and Choreographic Passports 9. Dancing Culture, Talking Global 10. Choreography in Ghana: evolving methods and techniques 11. Choreography as Research: Iteration, Object, Context Section 3. Choreography, Politics and Power Section Introduction 12. Vulnerable practice: Thinking through discomfort and precarity in Project O's Voodoo (2017) 13. Dancing Simply together: an example transdisciplinary research in arts and sciences 14. Prize-winning dances; choreography and the competition stage 15. Multifarious identity: Barbardian street dance on the concert stage 16. Moving into Action: change-making through dance activism Section 4. Choreography and Interdisciplinary Arts Practice Section Introduction 17. Choreography as a practice of border crossing: ten insights into embracing the impossible in interdisciplinary dance practice 18. HOMECOMING 19. Beyond Dancing: The Choreographic Turn in the 2022 Taiwan Arts Biennial 20. Dance in the Museum 21. From Improvements to Care: gardening as choreographic dwelling Section 5. Technology, Transmission and Immersion Section Introduction 22. Unlocking Touch 23. Virtual Reality and Dance-Making: unbounding choreographic practice from the realm of real-time performance 24. Social Media and Choreographic Practice: Tools for collaboration, co-creation and creative practice 25. Shifts in Embodiment: Choreographic practice for Virtual Reality Section 6. Choreographic Environments and Interventions Section Introduction 26. Navigating Diasporic 'Third Spaces' and (New) Borderlands through Dance and Choreography 27. Dancing Places: Sites, Situations, and Taking-Place 28. Sensóriagrafia in Public Spaces: Dance and words as a relational sensory, poetic intervention 29. A Reservoir of Gestures, or Choreography is Relational 30. Unlocking Liberation: Choreographing the 'Club State'