[What follows is] a list of statewide college and university programs [as of 2014] which offer a dance major or concentration to matriculating students in Connecticut. [This page is intended to serve as an archive for The Invisible City Project website. While this information is not updated, it is my hope that its contents continue to provide a point of entry.]
Central Connecticut State University (CCSU)
CCSU | Dept. of Physical Education and Human Performance | Dept. of Theatre | 1615 Stanley Street | New Britain, CT | 06050
Catherine J. Fellows, Dance Program Director/Adviser
The Central Connecticut State University Dance Program offers a formal pathway to dance certification (B.S. Ed.) and the curricula to support a dance cross endorsement. A cross endorsement is an additional teacher certification. The Dance Education cross endorsement may be pursued along with any other education major. The Department of Theatre offers a Bachelor of Fine Arts (B.F.A.) degree in Dance Performance, as well as a dance minor. As a result, the CCSU dance program has two homes; The Department of Physical Education & Human Performance in the School of Education and Professional Studies and Theatre in the Carol A. Ammon School of Arts and Sciences. CCSU’s dance program is committed to teaching dance education as our primary focus. Students have the opportunity to perform their own works, faculty choreography and pieces by visiting guest instructors in studio performances and main stage productions. Dance education embraces pedagogy, personal development, wellness, technical dance training, growth in knowledge and skills, and exploration and application of creativity.
Connecticut College
Department of Dance | Box 5204 | Connecticut College | 270 Mohegan Avenue | New London, CT | 06320-4196
David Dorfman, Department Chair
In the dance department at Connecticut College, we encourage you to find your individual artistic voice. As a dance major, you may find yours in our focus areas of movement technique, dance studies (history and theory), and choreography and improvisation. Our faculty are actively engaged in creating and presenting dance nationally and internationally. We work with integrity, rigor and diligence in order to teach you to be a citizen who contributes to the world. As a dance major, you will graduate to become part of the next generation of trailblazing dance artists. The dance department strives to: Offer a diverse range of movement techniques; Instill a deep and factual understanding of anatomical information in order to be more articulate in the body; Expose our students to artistic traditions and current trends in dance-making; Foster critical thinking and emphasize the ability to express oneself through language; Raise social and cultural awareness; Provide a methodology for creation, editing and presentation of one’s work in order to move from conceptual idea to performance; Facilitate a high level of craft alongside a radical artistic voice in choreographic work.
Naugatuck Valley Community College
Naugatuck Valley Community College | 750 Chase Parkway | Waterbury, CT | 06708
Dance courses provide students with a broad base of cultural and historical knowledge as well as technique, pedagogy and repertoire in the various dance genres. The creative process is fostered by inclusion of production skills, the art of choreography, and performance opportunities. This foundation will prepare students to further their study, teach, choreograph, and/or perform. Graduates may seek employment in dance education, dance studios, community service organizations, and as production assistants, choreographers, teacher assistants, dance therapy assistants, and as dancers in the arts and entertainment industry. Earn an Associate Degree, Certificate or take a Course or two. The requirements for a degree in visual and performing arts allow you to transfer seamlessly to most four-year colleges and to successfully complete your bachelor’s degree in dance without loss of credit or time.
Trinity College
300 Summit Street | Hartford CT 06106
Students in Trinity College’s Theater and Dance experience what it means to be a performing artist engaged in creative work in both the studio and on the stage. Our courses allow for in-depth exploration of theater and dance as individual disciplines, and explore the many ways these two performing arts interact. As a student, you’ll gain exposure to a diverse range of theatrical practices over time and across cultures as you research a historical time period to build a dramatic character, learn movement gestures that carry meaning in a particular cultural context, and consider how performance shapes our experience to bring about social change. Our faculty members bring professional experience to the classroom and to the stage, and they are dedicated teacher/artists committed to nurturing each individual student’s artistic growth and direction. You’ll be encouraged to engage in a wide range of performance opportunities, create your own performance work in response to themes and ideas you encounter across the liberal arts curriculum, and take advantage of the artistic resources of the city of Hartford and beyond. Theater and Dance at Trinity is an opportunity to discover the connection between you the artist and the world around you.
University of Hartford, The Hartt School
The Hartt School | University of Hartford | 200 Bloomfield Avenue | West Hartford, CT | 06117-1599
Stephen Pier, Dance Division Chair
The Hartt School offers a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree with programs in Dance Performance or Ballet Pedagogy (teaching), which are accredited by the National Association of Schools of Dance (NASD). Hartt dancers develop their skills through many performance opportunities, teaching internships and participation in a rigorous conservatory-style curriculum, with expert instruction from world-renowned faculty and guest artists. Performance opportunities begin freshman year and are available to all majors. Students train in classical ballet, modern dance and contemporary techniques with additional coursework in music, dance composition, pedagogy, performance techniques, kinesiology, repertory, technology in dance, and dance history. It is our goal to graduate technically competent, knowledgeable artists, capable of adapting to the varied demands of a career in dance and prepared to lead the field of dance into the future.
Wesleyan University
45 Wyllys Avenue| Middletown, CT | 06459
The Dance Department at Wesleyan is a contemporary program with a global perspective. The curriculum, faculty research, and pedagogy all center on the relationships between theory and practice, embodied learning, and the potential dance making has to be a catalyst for social change. Within that rigorous context, students encounter a diversity of approaches to making, practicing, and analyzing dance in an intimate learning atmosphere. The program embraces classical forms from ballet, Bharata Natyam, Javanese, and Ghanaian, to experimental practices that fuse tradition and experimentation into new, contemporary forms. The emphasis of the major is on creating original scholarship, be it choreographic or written, that views dance within a specific cultural context, interrogates cultural assumptions, and is informed by a critical and reflective perspective.
Yale University
220 York Street, Rm 102 | New Haven, CT 06520
Building on the foundation of occasional dance courses offered at Yale since the early 1980s, since 2006 Theater Studies has supported a wide-ranging program in dance studies. The curriculum consists of studio and seminar courses that cover the history, theory, and practice of dance forms spanning time and geography, from contemporary West African dance to The Twist. The dance studies curriculum emphasizes the study of movement as a window into larger cultural processes and historical frameworks. In keeping with the mission of Theater Studies, the courses combine practical and theoretical approaches to deepening students’ understanding. In the studio courses, practical execution in the form of mastering diverse dance techniques, canonical repertory and choreographic methods is treated as an invaluable component of research and writing. The curriculum further investigates the fluid and fraught relationship between movement and language. Students develop a shared critical vocabulary for reading, interpreting and writing about dance, even as many of them learn to communicate their ideas through the creation of original dance compositions.
