First major study of two important contemporary female dancers.
Jawole Willa Jo Zollar and Chandralekha are major choreographers of the 20th century whose work will leave the dance field with a legacy as important and strong as that of Martha Graham and Doris Humphrey. Zollar is Artistic Director of the world-renowned company, The Urban Bush Women (based in New York City), and Chandralekha is an Indian choreographer (based in Madras) who has performed internationally and is known for her radical mixing of postmodern and traditional dance forms. In this nuanced and in-depth study, dance scholar Ananya Chatterjea shows how each of these choreographers has positioned herself through performance in terms of gender, race, and nationality. Reading each dancer's major works in order to assess their unique contributions to the development of global culture, Butting Out does important theoretical work to identify common threads in the history of cultural production and the aesthetic philosophies of the artists. Chatterjea draws on theory from an array of complementary fields, including women's studies, African-American studies, and postcolonial studies. The book is beautifully enhanced by 42 black and white photographs.
Chapter One: Premises and Locations
Chapter Two: By Way of Introduction
Chapter Three: The Body Mobile, Mobilized, Mobilizing… or Regarding Legacies
Chapter Four: Danced Disruptions: Postmodern Preoccupations and Reconsiderations
Chapter Five: The Historic Problem: Historicity as Legal Alien
Subversive Dancing
Angika
Womb Wars
Yantra
Metonymy Miming History: Hands Singing Song
Sri: Feminist Visions for a Powerful Future
Creating Alternative Communities: Jo Zollar's Bones and Ash
Raga and Sloka: Troubling Femininity
Dislocation and Roaming Addresses: Shelter and Bitter Tongue