| letter from the chair
 Welcome to the Ohio State University Department of Dance! I am glad you found us and I hope you find this site a helpful introduction to our programs and some of the creative and scholarly research happening here.
...feel your weight, drop into the floor...
...how many different ways can you turn around an axis?
...chassé, pas de bourrée... and draw that phrase out...
...what assumptions are hidden or inscribed, in your body's attitude?
...good! now your craft can enable the passion to be revealed!
You can walk the halls, peek into the studios and hear the faculty and students engaged in dance making. From undergraduate students' explorations of dance materials, history, and notation to graduate students' investigations of theory, analysis of movement, and meaning in dance, the department of dance thrives on making connections between dancing itself, and talking about, documenting, analyzing, and creating dance.
Our faculty members are internationally renowned choreographers, and performers with broad professional experiences, teachers with records of excellence and innovation, and artist/scholars defining the burgeoning field of dance studies and hybrid approaches to theory and practice.
We are a dynamic department, invested in the traditions and excited about the future of dance. We like to create, question, reflect, and we are proud of the many alumni who are movers and shakers in the world of dance: working in companies here and in Europe, teaching in numerous dance departments, and demonstrating entrepreneurial spirit in their own dance companies and other careers that utilize the powerful set of skills and values that are nurtured here.
If you are a prospective undergraduate student, check out the information on the BFA program, links to OSU financial aid and other helpful sites.
If you are a prospective graduate student, be sure to read the MFA and PhD program information and links to some of what Columbus has to offer.
Check out the College of the Arts calendar, as well as current year dance productions here and information on our neighbor here at Ohio State: the world class contemporary visual and performing arts Wexner Center. Feel free to contact us with any questions or comments.
Thank you,
Susan Van Pelt Petry
Chair
department overview
The Department of Dance at the Ohio State University is
a community of diverse individuals trained on a common nexus
of inquiry, the rich and complex phenomenon of dance. We
are a faculty of eighteen, supported by a dedicated and
knowledgeable staff, adjunct educators, guest artists and
visiting scholars. We are a group of approximately 125 undergraduates,
pursuing studies that lead to a BFA in Dance, and a group
of approximately 35 graduate students pursuing the MA or
MFA degree.
We are more than 1500 elective students, some
of whom are also declared dance minors.
Significantly, our interactions spill into and out of these
neat divisions, with mergers between undergraduate and graduate
classes and performances, as well as multiple alliances
between graduate and faculty research interests. The organization
of the department tends to be democratic rather than hierarchical,
with committees of faculty and students working in concert
to make recommendations for the department as a whole. We
view the breadth of our program as both appropriate to the
academic setting and as responsible practice, educating
students in a comprehensive way within the lively discourse
of a major research university, and providing multipleavenues
toward future careers within an evolving field.
At the heart of the OSU Dance experience is the notion of
embodied scholarship, embracing the intertwining areas of
physical practice, creative activity and theoretical inquiry.
We invest our time, energy, expertise and resources in studies
of performance and composition, history, production, Laban
studies, dance and technology, dance documentation, theory
and analysis; and we extend ourselves into collaborations
with other disciplines, from music and theatre to women's
studies and creative writing, as well as into the larger
communities around us. We view and continually seek to renew
our place as an active forefront in the field, nurturing
links to the professional world and fostering those connections
for ourselves and our students.
We are writers of books and makers of dances; passionate
learners and dedicated teachers; we are performers and leaders;
advocates and innovators; nurturers and creators and investigators.
We are Dance at the Ohio State University. Come and see
what we have to offer!
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