Historical Inscriptions

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Session 40	Historical Inscriptions
E. Hollister Mathis-Masury	Gendering in the Ascription of Symbolic Meaning to Dance in Germany?
	This presentation deals with the current status of dance studies in Germany, focusing particularly on the situation in Baden-Württemberg, the home state of the internationally renowned Stuttgart Ballet. Whereas German dance companies enjoy some of the highest subsidies in the world, and free-lance dancers in Germany benefit from privileges in the German social system, dance is not an independent subject of study at any level of the German educational system. The strong discrepancies in educational, cultural and social policy on dance are indicative of the limits of and disagreements within symbolic meaning ascribed to dance. The relevant areas of policy will be presented, as well as the historical factors in the development of these discrepancies. A discussion of the role of gendering in the ascription of symbolic meanings to dance follows, especially considering current developments regarding community building and social justice.
Elizabeth McPherson	Hortense Lieberthal Zera’s Solo Never Sign a Letter Mrs. (1939), an Early Exploration into the Restrictions of Social Etiquette Rules
	Hortense Lieberthal Zera choreographed Never Sign a Letter Mrs. in the summer of 1939 at The Bennington School of the Dance held at Mills College where Zera was assisting Martha Hill and Bessie Schönberg. Zera’s dance was filmed as part of a “movie short,” designed to precede a feature film. The dance examines the restrictions of etiquette rules, specifically the rule that a woman should use only her husband’s first name after the title Mrs., i.e. Mrs. John Brown, not Mrs. Mary Brown. Zera choreographed the dance nineteen years after the passage of the women’s right to vote, at a time when women were questioning society’s rules for their roles but before the outright rebellions of the 1960s. Through her choreography, Zera expressed personal feelings about marriage and societal expectations, with the movements indicating both acceptance and defiance.
Joellen Meglin	Victory Garden: Ruth Page’s Danced Poems in the Time of World War II
	In 1943–45, after her collaborator and performing partner Bentley Stone was drafted into the armed forces, Ruth Page created a solo dance program with a novel twist: in Dances with Words and Music, she performed poems, speaking as she danced. Under the aegis of the National Concerts and Artists Corporation, Ruth Page toured the Midwest and Deep South with a parade of wistful, antic, nostalgic, and parodic personae, based on poems by Dorothy Parker, Archibald MacLeish, Ogden Nash, e. e. cummings, Carl Sandburg, and Langston Hughes. Her dancing embodied her voice, both figuratively and literally, in ways that aligned her practical sort of feminism with creativity, cultural roots, wit and satire. She made a victory garden of sorts, modeling self-reliance and ingenuity with a patriotic streak. In this paper, I juxtapose excerpts of poetic texts, photographic images, and analysis of programs and critical reviews to illuminate Page’s danced poems and to discover the ways in which one woman celebrated imagination and meaningfulness in a time of war.

	E. Hollister Mathis-Masury, Assistant Professor, University of Stuttgart, Germany, Department of Sport & Movement Science. Owner/Director InCenDance — International Center for Dance (InzTanz — Internationales Zentrum für Tanz), a state-certified institution for occupational education. Founding Director TanzProduktion Tübingen e.V., a public-service, tax-exempt organization supporting regional theatrical dance. Director of 3-year pilot-project on dance in early childhood. Co-author of “TanzMedizin”, first book on dance medicine published by German chapter of IADMS (TaMeD). Professional performer in ballet, modern, musical, dance theater. Dissertation on Stuttgart Ballet and transnationalization. Teaches ballet, modern, jazz, improvisation/choreography, applied anatomy/kinesiology and dance history.

	Elizabeth McPherson received her technical training from Juilliard, followed by an MA from The City College of New York, and a Ph.D. from New York University. She is an assistant professor at Montclair State University and previously taught at Long Island University- Brooklyn, The City College of New York and NYU. Dr. McPherson has written the book The Contributions of Martha Hill to American Dance and Dance Education, 1900-1995 as well as articles and reviews for various publications such as Dance Teacher Magazine and Ballet Review. She has staged several historical dance works including Helen Tamiris’ Negro Spirituals.

	Joellen A. Meglin, associate professor of dance at Temple University, was recently appointed co-editor (with Lynn Matluck Brooks) of Dance Chronicle: Studies on Dance and the Related Arts. Recent publications include a chapter on the opera-ballet Les Indes galantes in Women’s Work: Making Dance in Europe before 1800 (2008) and an article on Ruth Page’s La Guiablesse in Dance Chronicle (2007). Joellen served as coordinator of doctoral studies in dance at Temple (1997–2006) and on the board of SDHS (1997–2003). Funding for her research comes from the Newberry Library, the Boyer College of Music and Dance, and Temple University.
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