Dance For EveryBody with Urban Bush Women

All students, faculty, staff, and community members are welcome to attend Dance for Every Body, a movement jam/dance class that embraces the idea that each individual has a unique and powerful contribution to make, and that our bodies are a powerful source of agency. The goal is for “every body” to find their level of challenge and comfort and partake according to their abilities, and to appreciate the groups’ diversity as an attribute to their community. This is a movement class designed for the community, so no prior dance experience is needed. Participants explore Urban Bush Women’s technique with close attention to breath, weight, call-and-response, and polyrhythm.

URBAN BUSH WOMEN is a groundbreaking Black women-led theatrical dance company and social activism ensemble. Founded in 1984 by visionary choreographer Jawole Willa Jo Zollar, UBW is an engine and amplifier for the stories of Black Women+. UBW combines radical performance, deep engagement, and ancestral knowledge from the African diaspora into a force that is urgent, forward-looking, and essential. UBW has defied expectations for over 40 years. The very bodies of its founding members – Black women of various shapes and sizes – changed the landscape of who could be seen on stage as a dancer. The work placed the concerns of such women center stage. UBW embraces radical storytelling to activate social change. Whether creating genre-defying work for the stage, guiding the development of Black Women+ choreographers and producers, organizing for justice through artmaking, UBW is an innovator, operating at the vanguard. www.urbanbushwomen.org

Sponsored by the Koenig Endowed Fund and Dance Department