Alicia Alonso

Alicia Alonso

Prima Ballerina Assoluta Alicia Alonso and founder of the National Ballet of Cuba and the Cuban School of Ballet died on October 17, 2019 at the age of 98. Virtuoso female dancer like no one before her. In an art dominated by the delicate and ethereal woman, she challenged the image of the female gender in classical ballet presenting a strong, athletic, passionate woman with great stage presence. 

Back in her prime, she awakened great admiration from the audiences of the Metropolitan Theatre in New York as few dancers did, and never had a Latina before her, a Cuban.

She could have stayed abroad in New York, in the glory of a dancer with such recognition ... but she decided to return to Cuba.

In a world where women are silent muses and men are the directors, choreographers and absolute leaders Alicia Alonso challenged the classical world again: she became the founder, director, choreographer and teacher of her school and company: The School of Cuban Ballet and the National Ballet of Cuba.

My ballet teacher during my years of study in Mexico, one the company's first-generation soloists and Cuban ballet teacher, Raúl Bustamante, told me that Alicia found her first dancers wherever she found talent regardless of their situation or social status.

She took young men out of the reformatory and told them to use that their energy for good. She was hard on them, demanding unwavering discipline. She helped them find themselves, to become fighters, adult men, dancers.  The Cuban School of Ballet has given the world a spectacular collection of first-class technical and artistic ballet dancers.  In Cuba she challenged machismo and aroused the artistic sensibility of an entire people: the male dancer in Cuba is admired as a national emblem.

Carlos Acosta from the Cuban Ballet Legacy

The scope of The Cuban School of Ballet, the legacy of Alicia Alonso has already become immeasurable. Their male dancers, ballerinas and teachers have sown so many seeds worldwide that the world of dance simply recognizes them and claims them as their own.

All ballet dancers of the world owe part of our artistry to the Great Cuban heritage. Especially in Latin American countries, as in Costa Rica.

I met Alicia Alonso in 1992, I was a very young ballet student. I was impressed to see an elderly adult dancing like her. Her visual disability was significant, she was greatly assisted so as to get her bearings. At that time in the nineties there was no talk of physical disabilities openly, especially in the dance world.  Also the stereotype was that elderly adults were considered people who had to retire and rest, age perceived as a disability as well.

In a rehearsal I observed, her daughter Laura Alonso was directing the rehearsal and coaching her. Laura was very hard on her mother during the rehearsal, she scolded her harshly, as she did not scold anyone. I understood then that professional ballet, like life, was hard and challenges of all types including disabilities, age, gender among others could present great obstacles, even for Alicia Alonso.  Dancing for her, as for all dancers, was challenging too.  Yet she danced.  The humanity and vulnerability of Alicia Alonso was what impressed me the most in my youth.

I want to remember her great like that, as an example of a well lived life, of being a dancer, of being a teacher, but above all as great example of being a wonderful, beautiful, strong and vulnerable, human being.

Thank you, Alicia, may you rest in peace.

Homage to Alicia

The Cuban School of Ballet

On the Transformative Process of Becoming a Ballerina

Costa Rican Ballerina, Valeria Arias in our first 

Choreographic and Artistic Collaboration together, 

Teatro de La Danza, War Survivors. Body Motion.

Oftentimes as a dancer teacher I have felt that my students come to dance class seeking a profound transformation to become ballerinas.  The students seek the proverbial transformation from ugly duckling into the dancing swan. The artistic metamorphosis to become the butterfly.  They want to become the dancer.

Yet however this approach to dance training and education is conceptually and philosophically flawed: 

The student dancer does not dance to become a ballerina.

Rather, the student dancer dances to discover 

the Ballerina that she is.

We do not dance to become dancers.

We dance because we are dancers.

Moreover, we do not dance to become beautiful,

we dance because we are beautiful.

We dance as an expression of our unique beauty. 

Dance by imitation is not true art. It is in transformative dance that we find our unique voice and pure aesthetics.  We find our voice.  The becoming of the dancer is through self-discovery, through a raw struggle of the self - of honesty and the persistent refinement of physical movement through the eternal balancing of self-critique and self-acceptance and the unravelling and revealing of the vulnerable soul.

To dance is not a metamorphosis but a revelation, a transformative process to become oneself.  In the grandeur, imperfections and vulnerability of the unique dancer: in the discovery of personal and unrepeatable beauty and the manifestation of art in movement.

Reach: A Pedagogy for Transformative Dance -Dr. Gaynell Sherrod

On The Road to Travel Upon

Researching is not an easy task.  Especially when it is a topic that one becomes truly invested in and excited about.  The idea of not developing the research as well as the topic deserves is a bit overwhelming.  Also, as one begins to read and find an echo in the voice of other academics it is easy to become mute and nervous about one’s own voice.  

Today I had a wonderful experience, we met with Helen Kindred our professor and leader for the third term of the master’s in dance Middlesex University London programme. As often happens in these meetings, we spoke about many details.  From this meeting I walk away knowing that I must read more about research and about methodologies in the inquiry process in general as well.  I know I still have many hours to spend mulling over my research.  

Furthermore, something very significant came up during the class conversation.  Many of us were very nervous and we were hoping to be able to outline, plan, and get our work ready for presentation.  Hoping to organise our writing and our artefact, to develop our work clearly and delimit our pathway.  However, it has been explained to us repeatedly that our supervisors cannot help us do such a thing.  It is impossible to delimit outcomes or map research still in development.  We ignore that which we do not know, and we are not sure whether what we suspect we will find is truly there.

My classmate Agatha asked today if any of us had found that our research has gone a completely different direction from our original research questions.  In my case it has. That which I deemed important is not so much so and the underlying reason and justification for all this hard research work has shifted momentously before my eyes.  My research has taken a new urgency after reviewing all this literature, field research and researching my dance community... I am now ever so convinced of the imperativeness to further develop my inquiry.  However, with this enthusiasm comes great pressure, both academic and emotional, to excel and do justice to such important work in my field and in my community.  However, I cannot jump ahead, and this was made evident today by Helen.  I am undergoing an extraordinary process now in which I am reaching out to my community at large and my dance community specifically has so much to teach me.  There is so much to understand and analyse, if I obsess with where my research should end, I might lose sight of where the research itself is heading.  I will not enjoy this unique moment of working the field if I do not focus on the research as it is happening and developing before me. 

I hope someday to remember this moment of my life with fondness.  This moment is special in that I have had the privilege of learning openly, with time and dedication and humbleness from others.  This moment is one in that I can and must slowly analyse and understand.  When I was younger, my bachelor studies depended a great deal on my organisation and mapping of activities I had to accomplish, exams I had to take, and even books I had to devour. Today in this dance programme research I am embarking upon, there is no such map... no simple activities to follow nor a right or wrong way of doing things.  I have had to learn to work with diligence and to listen with patience. There is no stairway to climb, but rather the success of this project depends on my humility, discipline, and diligent analysis.  This is about listening to my own experiential learning and to give value to the understanding and knowledge of others.  I must also deepen my philosophical grasp and understanding as I envision and others envision our dance community as it grows and extends, from the tiny classroom, to my city, to my province, and to the larger and beautiful country of Costa Rica. 

As I further understand the importance, the influence and the pathway of dance in Costa Rican early childhood education... I first must stop and patiently read the books, have the conversations, and then unwind and work through the different, difficult questions.  I truly do not know how this research will be shaped by the end of the year nor what answers I will find.  However, I will listen, and I will enjoy this beautifully and ironically, complex, delicate and inspiring moment of my academic life.  I cannot help but close these thoughts with a feeling of gratitude and a tiny little bit more clarity.

Costa Rican Ballet Dancers, Teatro de la Danza.
My student ballerinas from our Chroreographic Workshop class
 from Body Motion Dance Studio

On Knowing and Learning: On my learning about early childhood education and dance

Today I participated in a class discussion with my professors and fellow classmates of the Middlesex University master’s in dance programme.  The topic we talked about is a familiar one: on knowledge and learning.  One would think that after the time I have been studying this topic as part of my master’s programme, it would be an old topic by now.  However, the understanding of knowing and learning is an unfinished discussion in constant refinement.  Perhaps because learning is a process, an evolution of continual learning, a constant restructuring of existing frameworks and re-understanding of previous experiential learning and new learning one may have as an artist and as a teacher.  

My topic of inquiry is dancing in early childhood education in Costa Rica.  I am an educator and a dancer with many years in this field, yet however I am still analysing, refining and learning about this topic. I stand today in deep study and evolving my knowledge about dance education of early childhood re-reading and re-learning theory from a dance and educational perspective seeking best practices and a sound philosophical grounding.

One of the academic exercises I am finding I must do as a student is learning to integrate knowledge and learning about general education in early childhood and knowledge and learning about dance education itself.  Although both are extraordinary professions, I find that some of the most famous pedagogy authors have specialised exclusively in academic writing of general education without extending it to dance.  This educational theory must be adapted and analysed for our field of dance education in early childhood.  However, happily, there is a huge change in perspectives and more and more academics in education are beginning to perceive the importance of dance in early childhood. In the past dance was not seen as a central taught subject in early education, as has been physical education and music.  

Presently, as a professional in this field I am very excited to find this literature about the importance of movement in early childhood development and learning, giving dance the importance and protagonism that it should have in early childhood development preschool programmes.   My knowledge and learning on this topic are evolving with my new understanding of this extraordinary literature that I was able to start reading this Summer, and I am still studying to gain a deeper understanding of this field.

It is fascinating to observe the great change that my frameworks of knowledge undergo as one is exposed to new learning.  A great example of this is how my understanding and learning has shifted upon further research in my field as I began my inquiry into early dance education in Costa Rica. My newfound knowledge and understanding of the importance of child movement and dance education has indeed shifted in my understanding of childhood development itself.  Dance is not a ludic activity, but rather locomotion is a fundamental building block in childhood learning and brain development.  

All current literature and research confirm that students learn by receiving information through their five senses. The child breaks away from babyhood and becomes explorer of the world through locomotion.  The child’s nervous system activates, and the dancing child becomes a stimulated and receptive child, cognitive development, physical development all domains of development reaching potential neuro plasticity in early childhood at its peak.  The dancing child is alive, stimulated and ready to grow, mature, develop and learn.  

Early Childhood Dance Programme end of the year presentation 

with my youngest students and oldest dance students  as assistants, 

Adriana Porras and Mariana Solano

As I learn such important knowledge of my field of inquiry, my paradigms of knowledge are enriched and as a student I continue to strengthen my frameworks of understanding.

Furthermore, as I seek to deepen my philosophical grounding of my research.  My knowledge is shaken and enriched as I explore the teachings of dance of Indigenous and Afro-Caribbean Costa Rican dance traditions.  As non-colonised dance traditions, these dance cultures are developed with a rich and original grounding of the concept of man, life and dance.  

As I open my mind to new learnings, my frameworks of knowledge are shaken to their very core.  I find myself a humbled dance student once again, inspired and enriched by new knowledge of dance in early childhood in the rich tapestry of Costa Rican dance culture and diverse traditions.  I find myself wanting to close all books, dim the lights and turn on the music.  Wishing to relearn dance through the embodied experience of dance exploration.

A little bit of Costa Rican Indigenous Dance and Culture: 

The Fiesta de los Diablitos translates as the Festival of Little Devils, but its true meaning is closer to the Festival of the Ancestral Spirits. This annual celebration takes place in Boruca and Rey Curre, two villages that are home to the Brunka indigenous tribe. The town of Boruca celebrates the three-day festival at the end of December or beginning of January, while Rey Curre holds their fiesta during the first week of February.

- Rob Traquair

A little bit of Folklore Costa Rican Dance:

Interpretation of a folk dance that originates from Costa Rica. Done by Compañía Folklórica Flor de Café, based in San Pablo de León Cortés, Zona de los Santos, Costa Rica. Recorded in Barcelinhos,
Source: YouTube Folk Dances Around the World

On Returning to my Last Term to Middlesex University

This is the beginning of the end of my studies at Middlesex University London, as a student of the master’s in Dance Technique Pedagogy.  On Friday September 13^th, led by Adesola, we had our first meeting with old and new students.  It seems as if it was yesterday that I was a first term student as well, and yet this term is my last. 

This process started out as a dream of returning to the dance classroom as a student after years of dancing and teaching.  I yearned to become a student once again, to read and learn about the latest dance education theory and of proper technique.  I sought to be humbled and inspired.  To understand the journey the dance world is on and become part of the new pathways laid by my art form.  I have envisioned myself becoming a better dance artist and educator.  Little did I understand or foresee the personal journey I was embarking upon.  Little did I know that this process would open the doors of my mind, and I would come to rediscover myself as a dancer, and as a developing and transforming human being.  Through my professional work and through the analysis of my past learning and experiential knowledge, I have found a coherent and loud voice of the artist and teacher that I am.

For those who are not dancers, or even for those that do not seek the professional dance pathway, it is difficult to understand the building of a dancer’s story.  Dance life occurs way too quickly.  The dancer lives all the experiences that the non-dancer lives: growing up, surviving school and education, the constructing of relationships, the coming of adulthood, love and loss, illusion and heartbreak, success and failure, the choosing of a family- or not - the growing older. the sweetness of maturity… and all of these with a parallel and intense life within the dance studio and the stage.

When I have spoken to non-dancers, I get the impression that they think that a dance career occurs in a linear fashion that we dance somehow isolated from the challenges of a regular life.  I remember a dancer that danced by hobby telling me once that it was hard to dance when finishing high school, somehow, she believed that dancers on a professional track would be exempt from examinations or a regular academic schedule. This is incorrect perception, often young dancers can be found between rehearsals sitting in the hallways studying for exams fulfilling their school assignments and rushing their homework, often with heavy eyelids and a shaky hand.  Professional dance education occurs as life is happening.

The reality becomes more complex for dancers with long careers their dance story may feel fragmented as one switches roles between professional and personal life. Dramatic changes occur during the change from student to professional dancer, to the inclusion of dance teaching, to taking on dance leadership roles.  Dance life happens fast and agitated with the feeling that opportunity must be seized before it disappears.

Through the work structure of this master’s degree I have had the opportunity to sit down and reflect about my dance journey, tracing the paths and curves I have travelled upon.  The narrative becomes clearer, the fragments become a story with a thread that links between events weaving themselves through.

From my reflexive work for this master’s I have better understood my philosophical stance and found an echo of my voice through the extraordinary writing of other dance academics.  I have discovered that intellectually in the dance community we share more common concerns now through connectivism and a common desire to improve dance practices.  As a dance community we have become more professional an interdisciplinary in our work.

I started this master’s program hoping to be humbled by all the new pedagogical dance theories to learn, but what I have received from this process has been much greater than that.  This master’s programme has led me to deeply analyse my dance roots and my learning through the rigorous revisiting of my dance history.  I have had an extraordinary relearning of what I know and how I learnt.

I have had the experience of celebrating and relearning the teachings of my dance teachers.  I have been able to analyse the teachings of different dance mentors in my life.  I was able to rethink about my apprentice relationship with Miss Day, founder and director of the Washington Ballet and School, as she trained and led me towards dance education and leadership.  I have appropriately mourned her death, as I had not had the peace of mind to do when I was younger. 

In this process of reviewing my experiential learning I was able to better understand my experience and relearn in a deeper way and in a more conscious manner.  I have also been able to feel profoundly grateful for the teachings of my teachers.  As I close this phase of my master’s, I have emerged more confident of my grounding and now forever aware of the extraordinary cultural tradition from which I have emerged, and I must honour.

The impact on my dance community is immeasurable.  The teachings reaching students in their formative years is evidenced as children student dancers become adults and become professionals in their respective fields.  The understanding of the far-reaching knowledge, discipline and self-awareness acquired through dancing is reflected in my students personal development as the teaching and learning relationship extends from my teachers to my very own students. 

My beautiful ballet student Jimena, 

months shy of graduating high school

I am humbled by the interconnections of the dance world.  I understand today that in my hands I hold a tiny piece of dance history and knowledge.  It is a tiny piece of this greatness that I hold, and I too have the responsibility of sharing, teaching and honouring this tradition.  All of this with an acute understanding of the shortness of my very own life.

In the second phase of this master’s I have truly learned to research my craft.  This has been the most important learning so far.  It has been important for me to learn about the vast amount of dance literature that exists in international libraries.  Long after I will conclude my studies, I will continue learning, I am forever aware of the existent literature and knowledge.  Also, I have discovered the great pleasure of reading and learning from the interconnected and greater dance community.

With great excitement I have entered the last stage of my studies.  I am about to start my field research and I am thinking of shaping my artefact and my writing.  I must admit I feel a twinge of sadness knowing that this will all come to an end soon.  I will miss the challenges of the studying for my master’s degree and will miss the companionship of my classmates and professor programme leaders.  However, despite my sadness of this ending, the transformative changes that I have lived through this process as a dance professional will continue with me and have already marked me profoundly.

Dance Science and Training Alternatives

My highly intelligent and analytical student Ana Laura Montenegro, Eduarte Photography

As a dance educator rediscovering dance technique and movement through the embodied experience of my students, I have found myself becoming a dance scientist and observer.  As I reflect on my own personal experience as a dancer, I discover that although important to my dance culture, the traditional dance classroom was not what transformed me into a ballerina.

What did transform me into a ballerina?  A deep and reflective process of dance movement as it manifested through the unique embodiment of my own physical limitations and potential.  Dance work occurred first as a mental, cognitive map after hours in the dance studio.  Visualisation and the tying in of information: music, technique, sensation, motor memory and artistic interpretation all falling into a clear manifestation of sensation and sequence.

As a society we have had the "Rocky training method" sold to us by myth and movies.  The idea that if we repeat a movement endlessly to muscular fatigue and on the verge of injury the body will discover dance in a moment of breakthrough and inspiration.  My professional experience has proved exactly the contrary.  The excessive repetition of movement leads to injury.  The excessive practise of an imperfect movement leads to the solidification of incorrect learning.  Dancers are better served by few repetitions that are correct in their execution.  The reinforcement of mistakes is the biggest error we can make in dance education.  

Yet we endlessly allow students to accumulate hours of incorrect work in the barre and centre, thinking that with a correction or one hundred of them the student will emerge triumphant.  Yet we know from science that doing the same thing over and over will not result in variation.  

My work with dance students today seeks to work with targeted artistic and physical analysis.  Mental maps and cognitive understanding of dance take priority over brute force.  Strength is built upon through building of muscle memory and strength from micro movements and exercises that build up from the floor to the barre and finally to the centre and to autonomy.  Patience, discipline and consistency is key.  Speaking and verbal analysis are extremely important.  Dancers need to be heard and movement needs to be discussed.  

Dancers need time for reflection, development and discussion.  The dance teacher needs to be an observer and diligent scientist, understanding the unique cognitive and physical pathways that each student embarks upon.  The teacher is the guide in that exploration, the map creator and the motivator.  It is the dancer´s learning that matters most.  The teacher must humbly fade in the background and allow the learning process to take protagonism.  The most important thing to look for is not what the dance is, nor the dancer before the teacher- but the direction, the process that the dance and the cognitive development of the student is taking them to.

It is about allowing the process to become enriched and allow the classroom to be informed beyond the historic barre and allow relevant teaching alternatives to play in the correct moment.  It is about personalising dance education and allowing rupture from routine to permit true self-discovery and exploration.  Such moments are almost imperceptible to the student at times.  The student becomes.  As such, the transformative process process to the dancer may be as lost to them as it is to the butterfly.

A correct dance process will create a false illusion of comfort and familiarity.  The micro-improvements of the student will lead to an extraordinary process through which they will discover themselves at the end of the educational cycle dancing choreography they never believed they could achieve at the start of the cycle.  In the end the student will find herself onstage in tutu and en pointe, dancing the role of her dreams.  There will be no climatic Hollywood musical number accompanying the moment, and as soon as she will step down from the stage she will become even more critical of herself than she had been the day before.  This is the becoming of the ballerina.

On Dance Science

Exploring My Inquiry: On Learning About Dance and Early Childhood

    These first few months of the new year at Middlesex University London Masters in Dance Pedagogy and Technique (MAPP) has been particularly challenging.  This because during this module I have begun to shape my research inquiry.  As I have begun to read, write and analyse the ethical implications of my future research, I have embarked upon a great learning journey.

     I am both a dance educator and an early childhood educator.  A few years ago, I was granted a scholarship to study as an undergraduate at the university and since dance as a mayor was not offered, I chose to study education hoping I would mature into a capable dance educator.  I studied hard for many years and graduated humbled by the great amount of knowledge I had been exposed to.  This last year I began my master’s in dance and as I started to read and learn about dance pedagogy, I felt a need to revisit my education studies through the lens of dance education.

     On framing learning, In A Handbook of Reflective and Experiential Learning: Theory and Practice Moon suggests that “reflective and experiential learning become more sophisticated processes variously following maturation, personal development and education.” (2004).  I always thought of these words in terms of my students, however in this instance the framing of learning has become more complex for me with experience and deeper learning.  The fascinating part has been that the new learning has occurred within the context of restudying and revisiting theory that I believed I already knew.  The knowing and learning has become more complex as I have re-studied and created greater connections between the different disciplines of practise and study.  Quoting Moon was again, perhaps I have improved my learning process, “Learning to learn can be characterised as the improving ability of the learner to manage the framing of her learning in order to fulfil more sophisticated purposes or to cope effectively with more complex material of learning.” (Moon, 2004).

     This analysis is about my learning.  It is about the evolution of my knowing about education and early childhood- it is about reading and re-learning theory and applying it to my current professional practise.  The integration of the knowledge of two disciplines, dance and education has required a complex analytical process that I did not anticipate.  It has been about understanding educational theory from the inquiry of dance.  It is the understanding of learning theory from a new perspective.  In this analysis new questions emerge; ethical considerations arise, and a brand-new reflection ensues.

   The original intention of my inquiry was to analyse dance teacher professionalisation in Costa Rica and to improve the delivery of national dance pedagogy with the aim of raising the training of dancers, starting with the earliest dance levels. 

   Upon researching and analysing literature it became apparent to me the extraordinary benefits that dance, and creative movement confers to students in early years of childhood.  An overwhelming number of authors concurred: notably among them Maria Montessori, Jean Piaget, Anne Green Gilbert, Anne O´Connor and Anna Daly write about the importance of movement and the impact on other areas of development of the child.  

     Dance benefits all domains of early childhood development: physical, cognitive, linguistic and psycho-social.  Anne O´Connor and Anna Daly advocate through their project Primed for Life, through which early years teachers are trained, “for a wider understanding of the body as a child´s first place of learning.”  (2018).  Through this research I have discovered an urgency of exposing the child to creative movement, a right of the child to discover the dancer within herself.  Movement in childhood development is not a ludic activity just to keep children entertained and tire them out.  All literature confirms that students learn through receiving information through their five senses.  Through locomotion the child breaks away from babyhood and becomes an explorer of the world.  The child´s central nervous system activates, and the dancing child becomes a stimulated, receptive child.  Neural plasticity at its peak in early childhood, a child is alive and ready to grow, mature, develop and learn.

    Dance education is central in early childhood, in optimising the child´s developmental potential.  The freedom of movement, to dance and discover is a child´s developmental right.  Dance for early years does not constitute just an isolated effort to increase the quality of a dance programme.  The outreach of dance and creative movement in the child goes beyond the dancing itself and into all areas of life and development.

     What does this mean in terms of my inquiry and dance in early childhood education in Costa Rica?  This is were my work is directing itself to.  Dance is not accessible to all Costa Ricans, the high cost of dance academies and the lack of government funded programmes make dance an activity of pursuit of the upper socio-economic classes.  Through further research I wish to analyse the potential of incorporating dance education in community centres and government-funded preschools.  This remains for further inquiry and an exciting possibility of application of dance research into the community.  Therefore, creating accessibility to the joy of dance to all children and to the great developmental benefits that dance, and creative movement can promote in early childhood.

Bibliography

Blom, L. and Chaplin, L (1942) The Intimate Act of Choreography. Pittsburgh, University Pittsburgh Press.

Gardner H. (1983) Frames of mind: the theory of multiple intelligences. New York: Basic Books.

Moon, J.A. (2004) A Handbook of Reflective and Experiential Learning: Theory and Practice. London: Routledge.

McFee, G. (1992) Understanding Dance.  London: Routledge

Suggested authors to read on Early Childhood Development and Movement/Dance: Maria Montessori, Jean Piaget, Anne Green Gilbert, Anne O´Connor and Anna Daly (multiple publications by each author)