She choreographed for Broadway stage productions and operaincluding Aida (1963) for the New York Metropolitan Opera. Dunham and Kitt collaborated again in the 1970s in an Equity Production of the musical Peg, based on the Irish play, Peg O' My Heart. Dunham's background as an anthropologist gave the dances of the opera a new authenticity. [37] One historian noted that "during the course of the tour, Dunham and the troupe had recurrent problems with racial discrimination, leading her to a posture of militancy which was to characterize her subsequent career."[38]. A highlight of Dunham's later career was the invitation from New York's Metropolitan Opera to stage dances for a new production of Aida, starring soprano Leontyne Price. From the 40s to the 60s, Dunham and her dance troupe toured to 57 countries of the world. In 1966, she served as a State Department representative for the United States to the first ever World Festival of Negro Arts in Dakar, Senegal. This is where, in the late 1960s, global dance legend Katherine Dunham put down roots and taught the arts of the African diaspora to local children and teenagers. Numerous scholars describe Dunham as pivotal to the fields of Dance Education, Applied Anthropology, Humanistic Anthropology, African Diasporic Anthropology and Liberatory Anthropology. Her work inspired many. Dunham, who died at the age of 96 [in 2006], was an anthropologist and political activist, especially on behalf of the rights of black people. At the age of 82, Dunham went on a hunger strike in . Dunham technique is also inviting to the influence of cultural movement languages outside of dance including karate and capoeira.[36]. [15], In 1935, Dunham was awarded travel fellowships from the Julius Rosenwald and Guggenheim foundations to conduct ethnographic fieldwork in Haiti, Jamaica, Martinique, and Trinidad studying the dance forms of the Caribbean. Text:. One example of this was studying how dance manifests within Haitian Vodou. Later that year she took her troupe to Mexico, where their performances were so popular that they stayed and performed for more than two months. 4 (December 2010): 640642. Katherine Mary Dunham (also known as Kaye Dunn, June 22, 1909 - May 21, 2006) was an American dancer, choreographer, author, educator, and social activist. Dunham married Jordis McCoo, a black postal worker, in 1931, but he did not share her interests and they gradually drifted apart, finally divorcing in 1938. She describes this during an interview in 2002: "My problemmy strong drive at that time was to remain in this academic position that anthropology gave me, and at the same time continue with this strong drive for motionrhythmic motion". Omissions? Her the best movie is Casbah. The next year the production was repeated with Katherine Dunham in the lead and with students from Dunham's Negro Dance Group in the ensemble. Katherine Mary Dunham (June 22, 1909 - May 21, 2006) was an American dancer, choreographer, anthropologist, and social activist. In the summer of 1941, after the national tour of Cabin in the Sky ended, they went to Mexico, where inter-racial marriages were less controversial than in the United States, and engaged in a commitment ceremony on 20 July, which thereafter they gave as the date of their wedding. Her mother passed away when Katherine was only 3 years old. [52], On May 21, 2006, Dunham died in her sleep from natural causes in New York City. She also choreographed and appeared in Broadway musicals, operas and the film Cabin in the Sky. The following year, she moved to East St. Louis, where she opened the Performing Arts Training Center to help the underserved community. "Katherine Dunham's Dance as Public Anthropology. American dancer and choreographer (19092006). Dunham's mother, Fanny June Dunham (ne Taylor), who was of mixed French-Canadian and Native American heritage. On graduating with a bachelors degree in anthropology she undertook field studies in the Caribbean and in Brazil. Educate, entertain, and engage with Factmonster. Katherine Dunham in 1956. He was the founder of Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater in New York City. [54] Her legacy within Anthropology and Dance Anthropology continues to shine with each new day. Members of Dunham's last New York Company auditioned to become members of the Met Ballet Company. Dancer, anthropologist, social worker, activist, author. Dunhams writings, sometimes published under the pseudonym Kaye Dunn, include Katherine Dunhams Journey to Accompong (1946), an account of her anthropological studies in Jamaica; A Touch of Innocence (1959), an autobiography; Island Possessed (1969); and several articles for popular and scholarly journals. Retrieved from the Library of Congress, www.loc.gov/item/ihas.200003840/. According to the Katherine Dunham Centers for Arts and Humanities, Dunham never thought she'd have a career in dance, although she did study with ballerina and choreographer Ruth Page, among others. She made world tours as a dancer, choreographer, and director of her own dance company. She is best known for bringing African and Caribbean dance styles to the US [1]. She made national headlines by staging a hunger strike to protest the U.S. governments repatriation policy for Haitian immigrants. Katherine was also an activist, author, educator, and anthropologist. She felt it was necessary to use the knowledge she gained in her research to acknowledge that Africanist esthetics are significant to the cultural equation in American dance. As Julia Foulkes pointed out, "Dunham's path to success lay in making high art in the United States from African and Caribbean sources, capitalizing on a heritage of dance within the African Diaspora, and raising perceptions of African American capabilities."[65]. [26] This work was never produced in Joplin's lifetime, but since the 1970s, it has been successfully produced in many venues. The Washington Post called her "dancer Katherine the Great." Throughout her career, Dunham occasionally published articles about her anthropological research (sometimes under the pseudonym of Kaye Dunn) and sometimes lectured on anthropological topics at universities and scholarly societies.[27]. Her field work in the Caribbean began in Jamaica, where she lived for several months in the remote Maroon village of Accompong, deep in the mountains of Cockpit Country. Her world-renowned modern dance company exposed audiences to the diversity of dance, and her schools brought dance training and education to a variety of populations sharing her passion and commitment to dance as a medium of cultural communication. USA. There she met John Pratt, an artist and designer and they got married in 1941 until his death in 1986. [22] Katherine Dunham Biography, Life, Interesting Facts. The living Dunham tradition has persisted. Birth Country: United States. Its premiere performance on December 9, 1950, at the Teatro Municipal in Santiago, Chile,[39][40] generated considerable public interest in the early months of 1951. The program she created runs to this day at the Katherine Dunham Centers for Arts and Humanities, revolutionizing lives with dance and culture. . Fun facts. Died On : May 21, 2006. A photographic exhibit honoring her achievements, entitled Kaiso! Katherine Dunham, pseudonym Kaye Dunn, (born June 22, 1909, Glen Ellyn, Illinois, U.S.died May 21, 2006, New York, New York), American dancer and choreographer who was a pioneer in the field of dance anthropology. Example. After this well-received performance in 1931, the group was disbanded. At the recommendation of her mentor Melville Herskovits, PhB'20a Northwestern University anthropologist and African studies expertDunham's calling cards read both "dancer" and . Tune in & learn about the inception of. Dunham also created the well-known Dunham Technique [1]. Katherine Mary Dunham (June 22, 1909 May 21, 2006)[1] was an American dancer, choreographer, anthropologist, and social activist. About that time Dunham met and began to work with John Thomas Pratt, a Canadian who had become one of America's most renowned costume and theatrical set designers. In 1947 it was expanded and granted a charter as the Katherine Dunham School of Cultural Arts. Alumnae include Eartha Kitt, Marlon Brando and Julie Belafonte. Dunham had one of the most successful dance careers in American and European theater of the 20th century, and directed her own dance company for many years. Also that year they appeared in the first ever, hour-long American spectacular televised by NBC, when television was first beginning to spread across America. Additionally, she was named one of the most influential African American anthropologists. After the tour, in 1945, the Dunham company appeared in the short-lived Blue Holiday at the Belasco Theater in New York, and in the more successful Carib Song at the Adelphi Theatre. Her father, Albert Millard Dunham, was a descendant of slaves from West Africa and Madagascar. After Mexico, Dunham began touring in Europe, where she was an immediate sensation. This concert, billed as Tropics and Le Hot Jazz, included not only her favorite partners Archie Savage and Talley Beatty, but her principal Haitian drummer, Papa Augustin. "The Case for Letting Anthropology Burn: Sociocultural Anthropology in 2019." THE DIGITAL REPOSITORY FOR THE BLACK EXPERIENCE. Katherine Dunham Quotes On Positivity. 2023 The HistoryMakers. Her alumni included many future celebrities, such as Eartha Kitt. 113 views, 2 likes, 4 loves, 0 comments, 6 shares, Facebook Watch Videos from Institute for Dunham Technique Certification: Fun facts about Julie Belafonte brought to you by IDTC! Decolonizing Methodologies: Research and Indigenous Peoples. One of her fellow professors, with whom she collaborated, was architect Buckminster Fuller. Time reported that, "she went on a 47-day hunger strike to protest the U.S.'s forced repatriation of Haitian refugees. Her dance company was provided with rent-free studio space for three years by an admirer and patron, Lee Shubert; it had an initial enrollment of 350 students. ", While in Europe, she also influenced hat styles on the continent as well as spring fashion collections, featuring the Dunham line and Caribbean Rhapsody, and the Chiroteque Franaise made a bronze cast of her feet for a museum of important personalities.". from the University of Chicago, she had acquired a vast knowledge of the dances and rituals of the Black peoples of tropical America. Johnson 's gift for numbers allowed her to accelerate through her education. Dunham created Rara Tonga and Woman with a Cigar at this time, which became well known. Katherine Dunham Facts that are Fun!!! Her popular books are Island Possessed (1969), Touch of Innocence (1959), Dances of Haiti (1983), Kaiso! As celebrities, their voices can have a profound influence on popular culture. There is also a strong emphasis on training dancers in the practices of engaging with polyrhythms by simultaneously moving their upper and lower bodies according to different rhythmic patterns. for the developing one of the the world performed many of her. The State Department regularly subsidized other less well-known groups, but it consistently refused to support her company (even when it was entertaining U.S. Army troops), although at the same time it did not hesitate to take credit for them as "unofficial artistic and cultural representatives". Back in the United States she formed an all-black dance troupe, which in 1940 performed her Tropics and Le Jazz . She did not complete the other requirements for that degree, however, as she realized that her professional calling was performance and choreography. [61][62][63][64] During this time, in addition to Dunham, numerous Black women such as Zora Neal Hurston, Caroline Bond Day, Irene Diggs, and Erna Brodber were also working to transform the discipline into an anthropology of liberation: employing critical and creative cultural production.[54]. After he became her artistic collaborator, they became romantically involved. She had incurred the displeasure of departmental officials when her company performed Southland, a ballet that dramatized the lynching of a black man in the racist American South. Dunham and her company appeared in the Hollywood movie Casbah (1948) with Tony Martin, Yvonne De Carlo, and Peter Lorre, and in the Italian film Botta e Risposta, produced by Dino de Laurentiis. In 1992, at age 83, Dunham went on a highly publicized hunger strike to protest the discriminatory U.S. foreign policy against Haitian boat-people. However, after her father remarried, Albert Sr. and his new wife, Annette Poindexter Dunham, took in Katherine and her brother. She was the first American dancer to present indigenous forms on a concert stage, the first to sustain a black dance company. She created and performed in works for stage, clubs, and Hollywood films; she started a school and a technique that continue to flourish; she fought unstintingly for racial justice. Alvin Ailey, who stated that he first became interested in dance as a professional career after having seen a performance of the Katherine Dunham Company as a young teenager of 14 in Los Angeles, called the Dunham Technique "the closest thing to a unified Afro-American dance existing.". In 1945, Dunham opened and directed the Katherine Dunham School of Dance and Theatre near Times Square in New York City. Subsequently, Dunham undertook various choreographic commissions at several venues in the United States and in Europe. Much of the literature calls upon researchers to go beyond bureaucratic protocols to protect communities from harm, but rather use their research to benefit communities that they work with. 7 Katherine Dunham facts. Her work helped send astronauts to the . What are some fun facts about Katherine Dunham? Our site is COPPA and kidSAFE-certified, so you can rest assured it's a safe place for kids . As Wendy Perron wrote, "Jazz dance, 'fusion,' and the search for our cultural identity all have their antecedents in Dunham's work as a dancer, choreographer, and anthropologist. 1910-2006. She was a pioneer of Dance Anthropology, established methodologies of ethnochoreology, and her work gives essential historical context to current conversations and practices of decolonization within and outside of the discipline of anthropology. Retrieved from the Library of Congress, . [20] She recorded her findings through ethnographic fieldnotes and by learning dance techniques, music and song, alongside her interlocutors. Luminaries like Martha Graham, Doris Humphrey and Katherine Dunham began to shape and define what this new genre of dance would be. She was also consulted on costuming for the Egyptian and Ethiopian dress. Dunham, Katherine Mary (1909-2006) By Das, Joanna Dee. Marlon Brando frequently dropped in to play the bongo drums, and jazz musician Charles Mingus held regular jam sessions with the drummers. Katherine Mary Dunham was born in Chicago in 1909. Dunham herself was quietly involved in both the Voodoo and Orisa communities of the Caribbean and the United States, in particular with the Lucumi tradition. Over her long career, she choreographed more than ninety individual dances. The show created a minor controversy in the press. The group performed Dunham's Negro Rhapsody at the Chicago Beaux Arts Ball. Commonly grouped into the realm of modern dance techniques, Dunham is a technical dance form developed from elements of indigenous African and Afro-Caribbean dances. They had particular success in Denmark and France. Beda Schmid. [6][10] While still a high school student, she opened a private dance school for young black children. [60], However, this decision did not keep her from engaging with and highly influencing the discipline for the rest of her life and beyond. Chin, Elizabeth. These experiences provided ample material for the numerous books, articles and short stories Dunham authored. She also appeared in the Broadway musicals "Bal . Additionally, she worked closely with Vera Mirova who specialized in "Oriental" dance. Retrieved from the Library of Congress, . Dunham considered some really important and interesting issues, like how class and race issues translate internationally, being accepted into new communities, different types of being black, etc. Ruth Page had written a scenario and choreographed La Guiablesse ("The Devil Woman"), based on a Martinican folk tale in Lafcadio Hearn's Two Years in the French West Indies. The Katherine Dunham Company became an incubator for many well known performers, including Archie Savage, Talley Beatty, Janet Collins, Lenwood Morris, Vanoye Aikens, Lucille Ellis, Pearl Reynolds, Camille Yarbrough, Lavinia Williams, and Tommy Gomez. The school was managed in Dunham's absence by Syvilla Fort, one of her dancers, and thrived for about 10 years. Katherine returnedto to the usa in 1931 miss Dunham met one of. [4], Katherine Mary Dunham was born on 22 June 1909 in a Chicago hospital. He started doing stand-up comedy in the late 1980s. He lived on 5 January 1931 and passed away on 1 December 1989. Radcliffe-Brown, Edward Sapir, Melville Herskovits, Lloyd Warner and Bronisaw Malinowski. [2] Most of Dunham's works previewed many questions essential to anthropology's postmodern turn, such as critiquing understandings of modernity, interpretation, ethnocentrism, and cultural relativism. Katherine Dunham (1909-2006) brought African dance aesthetics to the United States, forever influencing modern and jazz dance. Katherine Johnson, ne Katherine Coleman, also known as (1939-56) Katherine Goble, (born August 26, 1918, White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia, U.S.died February 24, 2020, Newport News, Virginia), American mathematician who calculated and analyzed the flight paths of many spacecraft during her more than three decades with the U.S. space program. In Boston, then a bastion of conservatism, the show was banned in 1944 after only one performance. Her legacy was far-reaching, both in dance and her cultural and social work. : Writings by and About Katherine Dunham. As one of her biographers, Joyce Aschenbrenner, wrote: "Today, it is safe to say, there is no American black dancer who has not been influenced by the Dunham Technique, unless he or she works entirely within a classical genre",[2] and the Dunham Technique is still taught to anyone who studies modern dance. Example. Dancers are frequently instructed to place weight on the balls of their feet, lengthen their lumbar and cervical spines, and breathe from the abdomen and not the chest. On this Wikipedia the language links are at the top of the page across from the article title. [3] She created many all-black dance groups. Actress: Star Spangled Rhythm. Cruz Banks, Ojeya. While in Haiti, Dunham investigated Vodun rituals and made extensive research notes, particularly on the dance movements of the participants. Our editors will review what youve submitted and determine whether to revise the article. After the 1968 riots following the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr., Dunham encouraged gang members in the ghetto to come to the center to use drumming and dance to vent their frustrations. [10], After completing her studies at Joliet Junior College in 1928, Dunham moved to Chicago to join her brother Albert at the University of Chicago. In 1963, she became the first African American to choreograph for the Met since Hemsley Winfield set the dances for The Emperor Jones in 1933. Katherine Dunham (born June 22, 1909) [1] was an American dancer, choreographer, and anthropologist [1]. However, one key reason was that she knew she would be able to reach a broader public through dance, as opposed to the inaccessible institutions of academia. She also continued refining and teaching the Dunham Technique to transmit that knowledge to succeeding generations of dance students. ZURICH Othella Dallas lay on the hardwood . The prince was then married to actress Rita Hayworth, and Dunham was now legally married to John Pratt; a quiet ceremony in Las Vegas had taken place earlier in the year. Her choreography and performances made use of a concept within Dance Anthropology called "research-to-performance". The PATC teaching staff was made up of former members of Dunham's touring company, as well as local residents. Birth City: Decatur. Dunham had one of the most successful dance careers of the 20th century, and directed her own dance company for many years. In addition, Dunham conducted special projects for African American high school students in Chicago; was artistic and technical director (196667) to the president of Senegal; and served as artist-in-residence, and later professor, at Southern Illinois University, Edwardsville, and director of Southern Illinoiss Performing Arts Training Centre and Dynamic Museum in East St. Louis, Illinois. Harrison, Faye V. "Decolonizing Anthropology Moving Further Toward and Anthropology for Liberation." Video. Throughout her distinguished career, Dunham earned numerous honorary doctorates, awards and honors. Fun Facts. She was born on June 22, 1909 in Glen Ellyn, Illinois, a small . Among her dancers selected were Marcia McBroom, Dana McBroom, Jean Kelly, and Jesse Oliver. Known for her many innovations, Dunham developed a dance pedagogy, later named the Dunham Technique, a style of movement and exercises based in traditional African dances, to support her choreography. The program included courses in dance, drama, performing arts, applied skills, humanities, cultural studies, and Caribbean research. Born Katherine Coleman in White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia . In 19341936, Dunham performed as a guest artist with the ballet company of the Chicago Opera. [15] It was in a lecture by Redfield that she learned about the relationship between dance and culture, pointing out that Black Americans had retained much of their African heritage in dances. A short biography on the legendary Katherine Dunham.All information found at: kdcah.org Enjoy the short history lesson and visit dancingindarkskin.com for mo. Her fieldwork inspired her innovative interpretations of dance in the Caribbean, South America, and Africa. [54] Her dance education, while offering cultural resources for dealing with the consequences and realities of living in a racist environment, also brought about feelings of hope and dignity for inspiring her students to contribute positively to their own communities, and spreading essential cultural and spiritual capital within the U.S.[54], Just like her colleague Zora Neale Hurston, Dunham's anthropology inspired the blurring of lines between creative disciplines and anthropology. In her biography, Joyce Aschenbrenner (2002), credits Ms Dunham as the "matriarch and queen mother of black dance", and describes her work as: "fundamentally . (She later wrote Journey to Accompong, a book describing her experiences there.) "[35] Dunham explains that while she admired the narrative quality of ballet technique, she wanted to develop a movement vocabulary that captured the essence of the Afro-Caribbean dancers she worked with during her travels. You can't learn about dances until you learn about people.
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