Course Logistics:

  • Instructor: Celeste Miller, M.F.A.
  • You may call me “Celeste” “Professor Miller” or “Professor”
  • Email: millerce@grinnell.edu
  • Phone: 404-625-4846 (cell).  *texting is okay
  • Course Dates & Times: M/W/F 10-11:50AM
  • Location: Bucksbaum Dance Studio
  • Office Hours: By appointment.  Please email or text to request a meeting.

Additional Contacts:.

  • Course Website: If you need help with the website, please contact Tierney Steelberg [steelber] and cc: Mo Pelzel [pelzelmo].

Wear clothes that are comfortable to move in/inspiring to move in. I want you to feel creative and energetic in your body. You may come to class dressed and ready, or use a changing room facility. There are restrooms across the hall from the dance studio. Until further notice, due to Covid, Dance Studio dressing rooms are locked and may be unlocked by professor on request for one person at a time use.

Required Text: “A Choreographer’s Handbook” by Jonathan Burrows. You may purchase a copy, or there is an online version available through the Burling library. I recommend purchasing if you are the kind of person who likes to make notes in the books you read.

Netflix Videos: We will be watching the Netflix Series: Move for this class. If you do not have a Netflix account, please let me know. This can be solved.

Links for all All other readings and viewings are hyperlinked in the calendar.

Required Supplies: An 8.5 x 11 (approximate – but not smaller) sketch book/journal, dedicated for this class. You can find an inexpensive one through office or art supply retailers.  Here is a link to a decent sketch book for a reasonable price from Office Depot. You may choose to augment your sketch book writing with colored pencils, markers or water colors.

Please bring your sketchbook/journal and writing/drawing utensils to all classes.

Technology & Equipment Access: You will be asked to video record and post your choreography assignments to our website. Your phone camera will work just fine for these videos. Tripods make this easier.  Some inexpensive tripods here; or DIY!

SPACE:  Your Pcard will supply you with access to the dance studio.  Between 12-4PM Mon-Fri, the dance studio is reserved for your use. Outside of those hours you can reserve the dance studio by going to Theatre and Dance Share Drive. On the landing page, click on Space Reservation and follow instructions.

Positionality Statement:

I am a white, middle-class, queer woman with an invisible disability. I am 69 years old. That is the position from which I operate in the world as an artist, a teacher and a human. I cannot change that positionality any more than you can change yours. I will work to support each of you in your individual identities and I will make every effort to structure and maintain a classroom and a course that takes your identities into account. I accept being corrected when needed. I believe we are all doing the best we can. It’s a process, not a fixed result.

Choreography: Physical Design for the Stage

explores dance composition (not excluding improvisation) as a tool for building and understanding creative and expressive embodied ideas in the solo form.

Learning Outcomes – In this course you will:

  • Pursue choreographic exploration and making in the solo form.
  • Experiment with choreographic methods as observed and analyzed in the work of professional choreographers, peers and self. 
  • Research choreographers and choreographic method tailored to your aesthetic. 
  • Identify cultural, social and political issues in dance.
  • Grow in confidence as a creative maker that centers the body as source.

We explore Choreography as areas that braid together:

  • Movement generation and manipulation.
  • Arranging generated movement through design, structures, patterns, and more.
  • Designing to communicating meaning. 
  • The big “WHY?”

We will investigate choreographic methods through personal investigation/creation combined with reading and viewing the work of a range of contemporary choreographers, and research into various approaches to choreographic methods. This course seeks to de-center European and American white choreographic methodology, exploring different cultural perspectives on dance-making methods and dance-making “why”. 

Part of this exploration will explore how choreographic tools entwine with accompaniments that may include music, word and silence; and also visual, sensorial, and experiential.

Learning Environment: 

I believe that each of you arrive in this course as artists, whether you know it, claim it, or not. We each have spent our lives in our unique bodies, with our unique histories, memories, desires and futures. In this course you will be supported to create from the center of who you are, following the direction of your aesthetic curiosities through engagement with our journey. 

Our classroom is a brave space where we support each other to do the daring act of creating with authenticity.

We actively learn from one another as we draw on our own knowledge sources and add to that knowledge in the process of continual learning.  

We will adopt (adjusting by consensus during first week of class) Community Agreements as a gentle guide to remind us to behave with humanity and love towards others and ourselves. 

TRIGGER WARNING: Some contents of this course may involve media that may be triggering to some students due to descriptions of and/or scenes depicting acts of violence, acts of war, or sexual violence and its aftermath. If needed please take care of yourself while watching/reading this material, i.e. leaving classroom to take a water/bathroom break, debriefing with a friend, contacting the SHAW Center. While it is inherently impossible to make any public space completely “safe,” there are things we can commit to in order to best care for our classroom and campus communities. Working towards safety does not mean that we aren’t interested in engaging with difficult, complex material or that we are afraid to talk with depth and authenticity as we develop our thinking around tough topics. Working towards safety does mean that we create an environment in which we’ve made it possible to lean into complexity and to be intellectually and creatively daring because we’ve committed to looking out for one another. Our classroom won’t always be an easy classroom, but it should be a place where we model respect, generosity of spirit, and lean into curiosity about different perspectives and experiences.

Being Successful in the Course:

(Desire an A)

An A in this course looks likes this:

  • Come to class awake, ready to work, and with an open mind and generous heart for your and your classmates’ endeavors.
  • Completed as least 12 of all 13 Choreographic studies.*
  • Fully prepared for class: Being on time, ready to begin, prepared with any notes that may be required from reading/research/viewing assignments for that day.
  • Fully prepared means that you have your journal and writing utensils.
  • Full attendance (if you will miss class, please notify me at least 2 hours in advance by text or email.)
  • HEALTH AND WELLNESS STATEMENT: If you have any symptoms that appear to be COVID symptoms, please do NOT come to class.  Instead follow college protocol for testing, quarantine, etc. We can work with any health issues that arise.
  • WELLNESS DAYS: I respect your honest request if you need a wellness day.
  • Arrive On time, stay for the full class time.
  • Submission of all assignments on time, or within reasonable time frame after consultation with professor, and content was up to your standard of excellence for yourself, your peer group, and what you presumed of my expectations.
  • Working for the fully allotted time is essential to our practice. If you are given 5 minutes (for example) to work on an improvisation or writing assignment, it is expected that you will work for that fully allotted time. 
  • Respect for our Community Agreements for this class

* In regards to grading: Completing 12-13 studies and all other work listed above is an A standing. Completing only 11 studies drops your grade to an A-; Completing only 10 studies drops your grade to a B+; Completing only 9 studies drops your grade to a B; Completing only 8 drops your grade to a C; Completing only 7 drops your grade to a D. Completing 6 or less studies is a failure in this class.

At the end of the course I will circulate a Reflection/Assessment form for you to reflect on your learning, provide feedback to the course, and assess your learning within the standard range of A-F.  In some ways this is a form of a Final Exam in that it asks you to make specific selection on topics, readings, concepts, etc. Your final grade will not be released until the Reflection/Assessment form is submitted.

ASSIGNMENTS: 

Please follow this link for an in-depth description of how-to for all assignments.

Instutional Statements : Attendance, Religious Observance, Accommodations, Academic Honesty, Writing Lab