Teaching AA Dance/ History to a "Post-Racial" Class: Yale's Project O

This article was more academically involved than the previous articles that were given to us and I appreciated it because not only did it generate rousing internal discourse about dance, but it caused me to really think about the state of our nation in terms of race and reflect on my stance in a “post-racial” America.

Though I was not alive when original Soul Train programming was being aired, I did live to witness the reruns nonetheless before they took the show off the air completely in my area. The article gave me additional insight on race relations and how separate but equal jurisdiction was represented in the media- something I feel was frequently overlooked and not included in pre-college curriculum, especially pertaining to dance. The literature caused me to question what it was like to be an African American during those times and see people that looked like themselves represented on television when they were once not able to fathom that notion. Shows like “Teenarama “ (which I had never heard of) and “Soul Train” reiterate Professor Brown’s proclamations pertaining to how dance has been used to establish a sense of culture and identity for Africans and African Americans and its stimulating to see how history continues to repeat itself.

I feel that television casted fatal shadows on Separate but Equal jurisdiction and eventually lead to its self-demise. The media has historically been a conduit used to amplify social change and thusly assisted (along with numerous cofounding factors) in changing the psyche of the American people at large. For instance, when semi-interracial shows and “dancing” became more common, television helped to exponentially expose the less progressive to images counter to their mindset and subsequently changing it- if not the adults, their children.

I appreciated the way the authors did not agree with notion that America is entirely post-racial- one that is backed by countless reports like the Zogby Report referenced in the corresponding section of the article. Though I feel that my generation does not have the hatred and suspicion that I (potentially ignorantly) feel jurisdiction and times ingrained in generations before me- I feel that a lot now comes down to social class. Honestly speaking, if I were put in a room with peers in predicaments similar to those in the movie Rize, I’d feel initially uncomfortable regardless of being of the same race given that I had no grounds upon which to relate. I digressed: to be more dance and article centric, I understood how the students in the program found it difficult to relate to the race tensions of times prior to their birth, however, I do not think that that should have inhibited their creative prowess. I feel that if they were to have engaged primary sources, historic documentaries, and had proper coaching, they would have eventually been able to generate moving, appropriate choreography. I do acknowledge that time was of the essence for them and also am mindful of my lack of experience with creating my own choreography and am thusly cautiously critical.