CURRENT POSITIONS
University of East London
Lecturer -Dance: Urban Practice
Study Abroad Coordinator for Dance
Joint Programme Leader - MA Contemporary Performance Practices
Past Positions:
Lecturer, Drama, Dance, and Performance Studies Department, Liverpool Hope University.
Visiting Scholar, Weeks Centre for Social and Policy Research, London South Bank University.
Visiting Lecturer, Lewis Center for the Arts, Princeton University 11-12.
AAUW Postdoctoral International Fellow, 2010-11
Global Scholar, Institute for Research on Women, 2009-12
Rutgers, State University of New Jersey.
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Ph.D. in Culture and Performance (UCLA)
M.A. in Performance Studies (NYU)
B.A. in Anthropological Studies of Dance (SUNY)
RESEARCH INTERESTS
Dance ethnography; Feminist and Performative Writing; Space, Place and Mobility; African Diasporic Dance; Migration of Bodies and Dance Forms
SELECTED CONFERENCE PAPERS AND PRESENTATIONS
7-11 July 2014 ‘Towards Critical Afropean Choreographies: Potential, Limits and (In)Capacities in the Circulation of Afro-Diasporic Dance Cultures in Italy’. World Dance Alliance Global Summit, Angers.
7-9 February 2014 ‘Afropean Choreographies: The Circulation of Afro-Diasporic Dance and Rhythm Cultures in Italy and its Economy of Desire’. Dancing the African Diaspora: Theories of Black Performance Conference, Duke University.
19-21 April 2013 ‘Choreographies of Afropean-ness: West African Dance and the Italian Geographical Imagination’, CORD Joint Annual Meeting: Tactical Bodies: The Choreography of Non-Dancing Subjects, University of California, LA.
17-20 Nov., 2011 ‘Afropean Choreographies: The Economy of African Dance and Drumming in Italy’. CORD Joint Annual Meeting: Moving Music, Sounding Dance. Intersections, Disconnections, and Alignments between Dance and Music. Philadelphia.
May 2011 ‘Postmodernity and the Effacement of Gender in the Italian Nordest’. Feminist Fantasies Conference, IRW, Rutgers University.
24-25 June 2010 ‘Performing the Other: The Choreography of the African Body’. Language, Space and Otherness in Italy Since 1861, International Conference British School, Rome.
5-7 November 2009 ‘Private and Public Space in the New Geographies of Production of the Italian Nordest’. Urban Culture Conference (MAPACA), Boston.
26-30 August 2008 ‘Crafting Cosmopolitanism: The Production of Postmodern Trends in the Global Regionalist Culture of the Italian Nordest’. European Association Social Anthropologists Conference. Section: Marginality, Nationalism and Citizenship, Ljubljana.
3-4 July 2008 ‘The Effacement of Gender in the Global Capitalism of Northeastern Italy’. LOVA conference: Ethnographies for Gender and Globalization, University of Amsterdam.
11-12 June 2007 ‘Meandering Through Northeast Italy’s New Local and Global Geographies of Production’. First International Conference of Young Urban Researchers (FICYUrb), University Institute of Lisbon (ISCTE), Portugal.
4-6 November 2005 ‘Choreographing the Cosmopolitan: How Families of Northeast Italy Produce Postmodernity’. Urban Culture Conference (MAPACA), New Brunswick, NJ.
8-9 April 2005 ‘Choreographing Family-Firms: The Confluence of the Local and the Global in Veneto’s Production Model’. In/corp/orations - Dance Under Construction, VII Annual Conference, UCLA.
4-7 Nov. 2004 ‘Family Capitalism: New Local and Global Geographies’. Mid-Atlantic Popular Culture/American Culture Association Conference, Buffalo, NY.
INVITED LECTURER
“Producing Cosmopolitanism: Postmodernity and the Effacement of Gender in the Italian Nordest.” Sponsored by the Italian Studies Program and the Italian Department, Rutgers University, April 2010.
“The Politics and the Policing of Tradition: Tourism, Ethnographic Perceptions, and Postcolonial Approaches to Cultural Performance.” Università di Milano-Bicocca, May 2008.
FROM DANCE TO THE NORDEST: RESEARCHING THE REGULATORY DISCOURSES OF DANCE & GLOBALIZATION
I came to academia after an extensive experience as a performer and choreographer in Italy and in the USA. As a dancer, I trained at the London Contemporary Dance School and the Merce Cunningham Studio, danced with several independent performance groups and worked as a choreographer. My interest in movement has taken me to South East Asia and Africa as well as throughout Europe and North America to explore diverse forms of dance and performance genres—from post-modern dance and Butoh to South Indian and West African dance, from Strassberg Method Acting to experimental theatre and multimedia performance—and to study dance and the body through different approaches—from Choreometrics analysis to Somatics. My background in dance guided my interrogations into my own aesthetic trajectory as a dancer in relation to the globalizing processes of my home region and into the primary discourses of Western dance.
DANCE-PERFORMANCE TRAINING
Schools
1991-2000 Susan Klein School of Movement and Dance, New York (Klein Technique)
1989-1992 Merce Cunningham Studio, New York, (Cunningham Technique and Repertoire)
1989-1992 Perry Dance Ballet Studio, New York (Ballet)
1988-1989 Certificate in Dance and Choreography,
London Contemporary Dance School (Graham and Cunningham Technique, Tai-Chi, Composition; Graham Repertoire).
Extensive Studies:
Postmodern and Contact Improvisation
Composition
Butoh (M. Iwana; Eiko & Koma)
Balinese Dance (Cudamani Summer Institute)
Hula (Luana Haraguchi, NYC)
Sabar, Traditional Senegalese, Malian & Ivorian Dance
(M. Basse; Aziz and Rich Faye; M. Mbaye; S. Soro)
Bharata Natyam(N. Eswar, V. Prakash)
Suzuki & Viewpoint
Experimental & Intercultural Theater
(R. Schechner)
Method Acting (E. Aiken)
Iyengar Yoga (NYC, LA, Liverpool)
SELECTED CHOREOGRAPHIES
Not in Our Class,
A dance-theater production presented at the Capstone Theatre, Liverpool (UK), 2013.
Lamé
Produced by SchioTextures: Dance and Theater Festival, Vicenza (Italy) 2003.
The Aging Daughter
Produced by Fabbrica Europa. Presented at: Fabbrica Europa, Stazione Leopolda, Firenze June 2001;
VIII Rencontres Choreographiques Internationales de Seine Saint Denis, Teatro Studio, Firenze (Italy)
Looping Corridors; Return
Choreographies for the camera, produced by PGPG Productions, NYC. Selected and presented at the “8th Raindance” Film Festival, London; “Il Coreografo Elettronico,” Napoli; “Dance Screen 2000,” Monaco; “6° Festival Internacional de Video Danza,” Buenos Aires, 2000.
The Lost Tension
Dance Theater Production. Collaboration with visual artists Robin Dash and the senior students in The Humanities Interdisciplinary Program. Presented at the Rose Art Museum, Brandeis University,
USA, 1998
Terra di Acqua
Presented: Cortile delle Murate, Firenze; Cantieri di Pelle: Ravenna, Italy, 1996-1997
Ricordo
Presented: PS 122, NYC; Context Performance Space, NYC; Cortile delle Murate, Florence, Italy. 1996-1997
Cava
Presented: PS 122, NYC, 1993
Bird
Presented at: DIA Center for the Arts, NYC; Dixon Place, NYC; Knitting Factory, NYC, 1992
Amber; When Are You Going to Get Married?
Presented at DIA Center for the Arts, NYC; University Settlement House, NYC; PS 122, NYC. 1991-1992.
COMPANIES & PRODUCTIONS
Procedural: Due, Tre, dance trio by Leslie Satin. Presented at the “Women in Dance at the 92nd Street Y: History in the Making,” (NY), 2009
The Enless Pace, project by Davide Balula, choreographed by Biba Bell,
(Mechanical Clock for 60 Dancers). Presented by Fake Estate and part of Performa09 (NYC), 2009
Sari Kusuma Piwulang, Javanese dance production, UCR, Riverside, CA, (USA) 2003
L’Alba delle Muse, a modern dance-theater production, Castello dell’Imperatore, Prato (Italy), 2000
Shyama, South Indian dance production, Kalamandir Theatre, Mysore, (India), 1998
Lo Sguardo Abitante, multi-media production conceived by Luigi Cinque and Officina Mediterraneo, Festival Fabbrica Europa, Firenze (Italy), 1996
INVITED EXTERNAL OBSERVER AND COMMENTATOR
Perempuan dan Seni Pertunjukan (women and performative arts) Yogykarta University--Dance & Theater Congress on Women and Performance, Indonesia, September 7-8, 2004
ADDITIONAL PROFESSIONAL ACTIVITIES
Diploma in Executive Artistic Direction
Program Sponsored by the Region of Tuscany. Florence, Italy, 1997
Research Assistant Choreometrics Project
Worked and assisted folklorist Alan Lomax with his Choreometrics Project. Association for Cultural Equity, Hunter College, NYC, 1995-96
