Year of Graduation
2024
Document Type
Thesis
Degree Name
MFA: Dance
Directing Professor
Jeffery Bullock
Abstract
\the ‘I’ in Invisible\ is a work of autoethnography that looks at the Black male body as a moved site of analysis to illuminate the performance of Black masculinity in Western concert dance as a means towards social survival by highlighting perceptions and tropes of Black, male bodies in motion. It is explored by looking at the embodiment of Alvin Ailey and William Henry Lane (also known as Master Juba) as case studies. This is presented in tandem with the rendering of an embodied, 21st Century griot practice to excavate, reconstruct, and reenact the history of the past in the present by engaging Black Cultural Memory practices. This is evidenced by looking at the obituary and eulogy of my uncle, James Sorrell, as a contemporary form of griot in practice.
Recommended Citation
Page, Edgar L., "\The ‘I’ in Invisible\" (2024). Dance (MFA) Theses, Hollins University. 39.
https://digitalcommons.hollins.edu/dancetheses/39
Performance Access Statement
If you wish to see the creative piece or performance that accompanied this thesis, please complete the Request Form, and you should receive a response from the Dance Department within two weeks.