Dance has existed as a vital part of every known culture throughout time. It is a distinct form of nonverbal communication that uses the body as an instrument of expression, articulating the culture and society from which it emerges. In Year 9's recent Dance unit, we focused on Latin American Salsa and contemporary Hip Hop. We studied the different cultures these dances developed out of and linked the two through a growing understanding of the need for dance in oppressed societies, specifically Cuba and the Bronx in New York.
Learning to dance and learning through dance allows students to apply their own experiences through a different language. Students learn to express ideas creatively as they choreograph, perform, and analyse dance as works of art.
At Shearwater, we focus on three main strands through our schooling: beauty, truth, and goodness. Between the ages of 14 to 21 the focus of our education is truth. At this stage of development, we see in our young people a righteous indignation for the wrongs in the world, specifically when faced with injustice, unfairness, and hardships that they themselves may not have previously understood. Through the study of oppression in Cuba and African-American communities in the US over the the past 100 years, Year 9 have come to understand the power of dance and the freedom that it brings.
Siobhan Hungerford-Gerth
High School PDHPE