Enlivening Dance History Pedagogy through Archival Projects

Dance archives can bring students into contact with historical subjects through artifacts of the past. This article advocates the use of archival projects in undergraduate dance history courses, arguing that such hands-on learning activities give students dynamic and interactive experiences of history. The author describes a creative project she has successfully implemented that brings students to an archive. Through this project, students learn about the choreographers and work documented in the collection, the nature of dance in past decades, and the process of writing dance history. Direct interaction with primary sources enables students to interpret the history of dance for themselves and encourages both empathy and imagination. To help other educators create similar learning experiences, the article provides tips on finding primary dance sources, gives examples of digital archives for dance, and makes suggestions for how to make pedagogical use of even a small archival collection.