Ballet, Blackness, and Womanhood: Rechoreographing the Classical Through Improvisation to Find Liberation

Abstract

The institution of American ballet has a history of systematically excluding Black dancers, especially Black women. Previous scholarship reveals that ballet is not inherently racist, especially considering the often uncredited contributions Black dancers have made to the practice and performance of ballet. Rather, ballet’s Americanization following George Balanchine’s defection to the United States created white supremacist standards and aesthetics. Subjected to stereotypes about their bodies and abilities, Black women are disproportionately barred out of the ballet world and the concert dance world at large, with contemporary dance spaces also using ballet as a means of determining one’s dance ability and potential. My thesis will argue that while ballet as an institution and as a practice has systematically excluded and mistreated Black women, ballet has value to the dance world––in professional dance companies, schools, arts institutions, and as a practice. I will argue that we can locate and salvage ballet’s cultural value and use it as a tool for liberation and joy both in and out of the professional dance world. In my thesis, I theorize more sustainable and generative ways for Black women to participate and excel in ballet by “rechoreographing” ballet. My rechoreography takes the form of a theoretical revision informed by interviews with six early-to-mid career Black women in professional contemporary and contemporary ballet companies. My thesis uses the concept of improvisation to engage with my ethnographic data in order to consider three main ideas in ballet: repertoire, relationship to audience, and technique. I make two major contributions to dance scholarship: (1) a Black ballet practice consisting of improvisational tasks, and (2) a manifesto that reimagines ballet’s possibilities.