DANC 117. Embodying Space and Place

By recognizing the relationship between the spatial, the cultural, and the socio-political, this honors seminar explores the following questions: How are places experienced and felt in the body? How does embodied performance represent and shape various scales of space: from the local to the global? How have dance and choreography intervened in geopolitical conflict? Space theorists will include a range of political geographers, architects, and cultural scholars: Arjun Appadurai, Henri Lefebvre, Setha Low, Doreen Massey, Juhani Pallasmaa, Edward Soja, and Yi-fu Tuan. Video viewings will include site-specific dance, staged dance, and dance forms practiced for community-building purposes. By foregrounding recent dance studies research, we will examine the important role both social dance and performance play in experiencing, understanding, and framing the local, national, transnational, and global scales of space.

Double-graded seminar. Registration for BOTH SECTIONS, A and B, is required for Honors students. Non-Honors students may elect to sign up for 1 section for 1 credit.
Humanities.
2 credits.
Spring 2026. Gerdes.
Catalog chapter: Dance
Department website: https://www.swarthmore.edu/dance

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