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Dance and Dialogue:
Human Contact and Democracy

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Rules and Creativity in Social Justice Activism

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Personal, Present and Immediate

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Play the Space

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Albert Boadella: Olfato al tiempo

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Ubú y la Comisión de la verdad:

Teatro, metáfora y memoria en Sudáfrica

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Eso, decían, yo quiero hacer eso:

Quechu y los zancos

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Research

As the King-Chávez-Parks Visiting Professor and Artist in Residence for Dialogue-Building, Diversity and Inclusion Initiatives at the University of Michigan, I developed various pilot programs that ask what the body can bring to larger discussions of diversity, empowerment, and inclusion. This experimental, arts-based programming included professional development trainings, interdisciplinary workshops, and a working group. 

The residency, a first at U-M, was sponsored by over 12 departments, and draws upon my ongoing research on the connections between a dance form known as Contact Improvisation and democratic activism in South Africa, Spain, and the US. The residency included specialized pilot programs in the music department, the Trotter Multicultural Center, and the Center for Research on Learning and Teaching (CRLT), in addition to professional development trainings and other programming.

The residency culminated in the interdisciplinary seminar Personal, Present and Immediate*: Making Performance on Socio-Political Questions. I also designed and choreographed Root Vegetables, a community-based diversity and resilience initiative in the U-M dance department on groundedness, growth, and expanding definitions of beauty.  The work comes out of reflection on larger questions of institutional and departmental culture, and ways of productively shifting micro-environments toward being more inclusive and welcoming for people from diverse backgrounds.

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Press

I was honored by the U-M President and Provost’s Office for my innovative diversity and inclusion work:

RC Visiting Artist and Student Present at
Convening of Campus DEI Leaders

For press clippings from other projects, see Press link above.

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Curation

As part of my seminar at the University of Michigan, Personal, Present and Immediate: Making Performance on Socio-Political Questions, I curated, produced and facilitated an interdisciplinary film series, open to the public. For more information on my previous work in curation, see Play the Space, a site-based performance series I curated and facilitated at First Street Art Park, NYC.

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Articles

Click on the links below for the full text of each article:
– Albert Boadella: olfato al tiempo (roughly, “A Nose for Timing,” in Spanish) (2002)

– Ubu y la Comisión de la Verdad: Teatro, metáfora, y memoria en Sudáfrica (Ubu and the Truth Commission: Theater, metaphor, and memory in South Africa) (2000)

– “Eso,” decían “yo quiero hacer eso”: Quechu y los zancos (“That,” they said, “I want to do that”: Quechu and the Stilts).  Interview with Argentinean director and clown Quechu Villalba  (2004)

All articles were published in OPHELIA, revista de teatro y otras artes (OPHELIA, journal of theater and other arts).
You can also view each article’s first page below as a jpeg image file.