Overview

The learning and teaching methods on the MA Dance Anthropology programme are designed to provide a range of opportunities for students to be introduced to new ideas and topics, to enhance understanding and to hone critical thinking and research skills.

Explore dance as cultural practice from the perspectives of those involved as dancers, dance makers, teachers, and audience members. By studying these perspectives, you will learn how different people around the world understand dance and how dance influences their value systems.

MA Dance Anthropology investigates dance from a non-Eurocentric perspective, placing the practices and values of the dancers into sociocultural and comparative understanding. At the heart of the programme is a focus upon ethnographic perspectives in dance to gain first-hand experience of different cultural approaches to dance practice. You will interpret your findings from the field considering contemporary debates in dance anthropology.

The course is of particular interest to those who wish to study non-Western, folk, social or ritual dance practices, but the approach can be applied to ballet or Western theatre dance, too. This course provides a way to contextualise dance practice and deepen your understanding of dance and specific practices that help define our humanity.

The school is home to the internationally recognised Centre for Dance Research, which foregrounds the research of dance as cultural and artistic expression as theatre performance and beyond. Through seminars, forums and conferences involving staff and international invited guests, the centre supports a compelling research culture.

We also have excellent links with dance companies and creative organisations. In easy reach of London's vibrant dance scene, the campus has superb studios and a state-of-the-art theatre for dance students.

Career Options

Graduates' career options are broadened to include roles such as a community dance practitioner, producer and curator of arts projects, teacher, or to continue into further study as an MPhil or PhD student. You will also gain PGCert and PGDip awards in this course.