Course Syllabus
Course: DANC 2330
Division: Fine Arts, Comm, and New Media
Department: Dance
Title: Improvisation (formerly DANC 2080)
Semester Approved: Spring 2022
Five-Year Review Semester: Fall 2026
End Semester: Fall 2027
Catalog Description: This course is designed for anyone who is curious about the practice of movement improvisation. In this class students engage in exercises and improvisational structures that are designed to heighten awareness, broaden individual movement vocabulary and develop skills in instant movement making. The dynamic movement work in this class is supplemented with readings from texts about improvisation and creativity.
Semesters Offered: Fall, Spring
Credit/Time Requirement: Credit: 2; Lecture: 3; Lab: 0
Prerequisites: None
Corequisites: None
Justification: This course is offered at university dance programs in the state of UT. This course fulfills a lower division curriculum requirement for dance and makes it easier for students to transfer into other dance programs both regionally and nationally.
Student Learning Outcomes:
Increased understanding of movement composition and its elements including space, time, weight and flow. This will be assessed through attendance, self-evaluation, peer evaluation, dance concert review, journaling, and instructor evaluations.
Increased understanding of partnering and its elements including yielding, weight-sharing and counter-balance. This will be assessed through attendance, self-evaluation, peer evaluation, and instructor evaluations.
Increased understanding of personal movement aesthetic and personal movement habits. This will be assessed through attendance, self-evaluation, journaling, peer evaluation, and instructor evaluations.
Increased understanding of improvisation as a process for creating and performing at the same time. This will be assessed through attendance, self-evaluation, peer evaluation, and instructor evaluations.
Increased confidence in quick decision-making as it applies to improvisational performance. This will be assessed through attendance, self-evaluation, peer evaluation, and instructor evaluations.
Increased awareness of both internal and external environments as prompts for spontaneous movement making. This will be assessed through attendance, self-evaluation, journaling, peer evaluation, and instructor evaluations.
Content:
Dance improvisation as it is largely taught today was originated by the Judson Dance Theater, a collective of dancers, composers and visual artists who regularly performed at the Judson Memorial Church in Greenwich Village, New York. In this class we will discuss how in their rejection of the spectacular, of the glamorous and of the technical, these artists were primarily influenced by the ideas of Eastern Philosophy especially Tao Te Ching and Zen Buddhism. We will also discuss the diversity of dance improvisation and show that it is not limited to Western European dance forms but is also present in folk dance, break dance, tango and other forms of movement from cultures around the world.
The course content includes the following:
1. The study of the elements of movement composition including space, time, weight and flow.
2. The study of the concept of yielding and its application to quick decision-making and safe weight sharing.
3. The study of partnering as it applies to movement improvisation.
4. The study of solo movement and group movement patterns in space and time.
5. The study of improvisational structures and their application to solo and group performance.
6. The study of personal movement aesthetic and personal movement habits.
Key Performance Indicators:
Attendance 40 to 45%
Classroom participation 40 to 45%
Dance concert review/Discussions/Journaling 10 to 20%
Student self-evaluation, instructor evaluation 5 to 40%
Pedagogy Statement:
This course is designed for anyone who is curious about the practice of movement improvisation. It welcomes students of all abilities, backgrounds and body types thus implicitly dismantling some of the following lingering biases of dance training: that ballet is the basis of all dance technique, that only ballet bodies are worthy to be seen on stage and that dancers are mere instruments of a choreographer's vision, and ought to be trained as such.
Instructional Mediums:
Lecture
Maximum Class Size: 30
Optimum Class Size: 20
