Humanizing Ballet Pedagogies

In Humanizing Ballet Pedagogies, Jessica Zeller offers a new take on the ballet pedagogy manual, examining how and why ballet pedagogies develop, considering their implications for students and teachers, and proposing processes by which readers can enact humanizing, equitable approaches.

Jessica Zeller, PhD, MFA, is an Associate Professor of Dance in the TCU School for Classical & Contemporary Dance, USA, where she teaches courses across the ballet curriculum and in dance histories, theories, and pedagogies. Her first book, Shapes of American Ballet: Teachers and Training before Balanchine (2016), unearths the teachings of lesser-known European and Russian ballet pedagogues and situates them in the context of early twentieth-century American Capitalism, and her research on ballet pedagogies appears in (Re:) Claiming Ballet (2021), Dance on Its Own Terms: Histories and Methodologies (2013), Dance Chronicle, and the Journal of Dance Education. Zeller is a past president of CORPS de Ballet, International.

Part 1 Philosophies 1. Ideal-Driven Pedagogies 2. Student-Driven Pedagogies Part 2 Perspectives 3. Teacher Presence and Behavior 4. Student Voices Part 3 Praxis 5. Student Agency and Autonomy 6. Evaluation and (Un)Grading 7. Reflective Practices