Dancing Ireni: Reimaging and Reimagining Alan Lomax’s Choreometrics Project

Dancing Ireni: Reimaging and Reimagining the Choreometrics Project is a three-day symposium celebrating both the centennial of Alan Lomax and the groundbreaking study of dance as formalized, culturally conditioned communicative behavior. Special guests and presenters include original Choreometrics Project member, Forrestine Paulay as well as Anna Lomax Wood, Martha Davis, Onye Ozuzu, Ann Biddle and others. In partnership with the Library of Congress American Folklife Center and supported by the Dorothy Madden Professorship in Dance, the symposium is open to anyone who wishes to facilitate cross-cultural understanding through dance and explore the future of the more than 2,000 dance film segments that comprise the Choreometrics archives.

ATTENDANCE AT ALL EVENTS IS FREE AND OPEN TO THE PUBLIC. See the event’s Facebook page.

Tentative Schedule:

Thursday April 16, 2015: Opening at the Library of Congress
Library of Congress 1:30-4:30
Botkin Lecture: Forrestine Paulay and Meri Lobel, Miriam Phillips. Moderator
Opening Reception 4:30
Thursday night: OPEN

Friday April 17, 2015: University of Maryland, Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center
9-10:45 AM: PAST: Martha Davis: Nonverbal context for Choreometrics, Forrestine Paulay and Anna Lomax Wood: Alan Lomax and the Vision for the project
Additional remarks: Ann Biddle, Meri Lobel, and honored attendees

BREAK

11-12:30 THE PRESENT
Todd Harvey: Current Status of the Collection
Susan Wiesner: Talking on the Same Page: Locating The Choreometrics Project within the Digital Humanities as the basis for a shared vocabulary across library archives, digital collections, and technology research
Ann Biddle: How I Use Choreometrics in Education
Respondents: Christina Banalopoulou, Kate Spanos, Sudesh Mantillake, Sinclair O’gaga, and Drew Barker: implications for archivists and researchers of performance

12:30-2:00 LUNCH: Informal buffet, tables: Student Lounge

2-3:45 FUTURE
Onye Ozuzu: Keynote on the value of the collection
Shannon Cuykendall, Sarah Fdili Aloui, Kristin Carlson, Susan Wiesner: What technology can do
4-5:30: Annotation tool: hands-on playing with video annotation and markup
Friday Night: Attend Open Dress at Dance Place: Rosy Simas: http://www.rosysimas.com/wewaitinthedarkness/

Saturday April 18: The Clarice
9am-11am: Round Tables
The Clarice:
1-4 Roundtable Breakouts:
Funding
Technology
Ethnography

11-1: Lunch (on your own)

1-3 Preinkert Dance Studio
Forrestine Paulay and Martha Davis: How to do a Choreometrics analysis and research for Cert students, CMAs, and anyone else who wants to get geeky

3-3:30 BREAK

3:30-5:30 The Clarice

Discussions:
Proposing Next Steps
Work Plan

6 PM: Reception: DANCE WING: for prospective CMAs, the community, everybody!

Register here: Choreometrics Symposium Registration