With Hopal Romans and Michael Joseph, in this chapter we remember our experiences in early Youth Dance Companies in Britain. For many young people dancing was a distraction from the turmoil of being a Black teenager in Britain in 1970s and 1980s. Dance also introduced the exciting new voices that were emerging around us in trans-Atlantic contemporary dance arts. Marginalized from auditioning for performing arts schools by cost and lack of access, as well as the openly racist aesthetic criteria for entry, our dance training comprised intense weekends of technique classes and rehearsals. Many young people from these early youth companies went on to have distinguished careers in dance internationally.
Citation: Akinleye, A., H. Romans and M. Joseph (2018) Epistemology of the weekend: Youth Dance Theatre, in Akinleye (ed.) Narratives in Black British dance: embodied practices. London: Palgrave MacMillian pp.265-276
Contents for context within book:
(editor Adesola Akinleye)
1. Narratives in Black British dance: an introduction – Adesola Akinleye
Part i
2. “I don’t do Black-Dance, I am a Black dancer” – Namron
3. Dance Britannia: the impact of global shifts on dance in Britain – Christy Adair and Ramsay Burt
4. Negotiating African Diasporic identity in dance: brown bodies creating and existing in the British dance industry – Tia-Monique Uzor
5. Tracing the evolution of Black representation in ballet and the impact on Black British dancers today – Sandie Bourne
6. In-the-between-ness: decolonising and re-inhabiting our dancing – Adesola Akinleye and Helen Kindred
Part ii
7. Trails of Ado: Kokuma’s cultural self-defence – Thea Barnes
8. Moving Tu Balance: an African holistic dance as a vehicle for personal development from a Black British perspective – Sandra Golding
9. ‘Why I am not a fan of the Lion King’: ethically informed approach to the teaching and learning of South African dance forms in Higher Education in the United Kingdom – Sarahleigh Castelyn
10. Performativity of body paintingL symbolic ritual as diasporic identity – Chikukwango Cuxima-Zwa
11. Dancehall: a continuity of spiritual, corporeal practice in Jamaican dance – H. Patten
12. Our Ethiopian connection: embodied Ethiopian culture as a tool in urban-contemporary choreography – Ras Mikey (Michael) Courtney
13. Reflections: snapshots of dancing home, 1985, 2010 and 2012 – Hopal Romans
Part iii
14. Battling under Britannia’s shadow: UK jazz dancing in the 1970s and 1980s – Jane Carr
15. Caribfunk Technique: a new feminist/womanist futuristic technology in Black dance studies in Higher Education – A’Keitha Carey
16. More similarities than differences: searching for new pathways – Beverley Glean and Rosie Lehan
17. Epistemology of the weekend: Youth Dance Theatre – Hopal Romans, Adesola Akinleye, and Michael Joseph
18. Transatlantic voyages: then and now – Anita Gonzalez