MFA Monday

by Lydia MFA Mondays

Happy Monday Framers!

Enjoy this MFA Monday installment by

Dr. Alexis Weisbord!

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Part 2: Thinking Beyond

Five years is a long time and a lot can happen during that time. When I moved to California in August 2005, I didn’t know exactly where I was going to end up in June 2010, but I would have told you one definite thing: I would not be in Riverside County. Yet here we are in April 2013 and guess where I am… that’s right, Riverside County.

As I previously mentioned, I entered grad school with no attachments that I was obligated to attend to or return to, so I figured when it was all over and done with I could go wherever the wind took me. I envisioned applying for fellowships and visiting positions, and I was going to live my dream of traveling and moving. I did not have any interest in setting roots anywhere yet, and then the most amazing complication occurred: I met a wonderful partner. This was wonderful for all the reasons and benefits that make having a partner desirable: he was a tremendous support through the entirety of my exam and dissertation process, he happily pushed the cart at Trader Joes and didn’t judge me for the 12 bottles of wine I’d picked out, he calmly listened to me stress about the writing process, and he was never bothered by the odd hours I kept. But… and most people wouldn’t read this as a problem, he already had a job. Not just a job, a career. And one he really loves. He spends his days getting paid for something he would happily do for free most days. And if that wasn’t good enough, it is incredibly stable and has great benefits. Again, who would ever complain about such a wonderful fate?! Apparently me.

There I was, recently out of school, newly married, and tied down to a city (more like a town) where my degree was completely useless. In a desperate attempt to find some work that didn’t involve pouring coffee or serving food, I applied to teach at a local studio. They had a competitive team program that was good but not the best in town, they seemed to like the class I taught, and I thought I had a great interview. I was so willing to do this job I even offered the same (low) rate I was offering when I was first out of undergrad. Yet, the same day my degree was conferred I was notified that I didn’t get the job. I was beat out by a student in the community college program I was an adjunct in. As far as I can tell, this was because she probably offered a rate that was a fraction of what I offered. Two degrees in dance, a dissertation on competition dance, years of experience teaching in studios and colleges as well as almost a decade working for competitions and I was unable to get a job at a studio.

With the exception of a local community college program, I quickly realized that I lived in a wasteland for the arts, or at least for the kind I was trained and qualified for. I was, and still am, on faculty at the college; however, California’s badly damaged economy has limited the opportunities I will have at this program for years to come. I applied for both part and full time positions within a 100-mile radius, and after some time, I started to realize that taking a job with a 90+ minute commute (each way) was insane if I ever hoped to have a family and be a part of that family.

I began to conceptualize what kinds of options might be out there for me. I began to think about all the other career paths I could explore that would require the skills of my PhD, even if it didn’t require the degree itself. I realized that since the jobs I thought I wanted five years earlier were not only difficult to come by because of the plummeting economy, but were even more difficult to find because I was now geographically limited. Since the community I lived in had no jobs for me, it was time for me to create my own work.

I have more or less taken every position that has been offered to me. Any day of the week you can find me donning four or five different hats. I once went to an event where I represented three different organizations simultaneously. Since completing graduate school, I have taught part time at three different collegiate institutions (including in a Global Studies program), began managing a small, but busy, professional dance company, became part of a collective of choreographers that produces events and workshops locally, found a local studio that I love teaching at, and I started my own local dance company. Meanwhile, I find ways to collaborate with long distance colleagues on scholarly work.

On my worst days I feel like my brain is going to fracture and cause me to lose my mind. On my best days I am completely fulfilled, feeling like I am not missing out on a single part of the wonderful world of dance. I get to teach all ages, and I get to perform when I want. I’ve learned that I love managing productions, and I never feel pressured when I sit down to write or research because it is always by choice. My days can be exhausting and I am excruciatingly underpaid because many of these positions are with brand new organizations that I am helping to build, but I see potential for a future in this wasteland that I live in. I see a future that I not only like, but a future that might just need someone exactly like me to help it succeed. The way I see it, no one may think that I am valuable now, but if I help to show them what I can do and what they are missing, then maybe one day there will be a local need for me and my degree.

I’d like to acknowledge that none of what I am doing in this effort is done alone. I have a small network of local colleagues who not only provide me opportunities but also support my endeavors. Together, I see us building a community that will not only provide for us but also for our neighbors. I am fully aware of the fact that my unstable lifestyle is made feasible by the fact that I have a partner whose stable job gives us many benefits, including health insurance. Because of this, I am able to take career risks that might not be smart decisions otherwise, so I recognize that this path may not be for everyone.

What I do encourage anyone, regardless of their marital status, geographic location or financial stability, to consider, however, are the many possibilities for their skills and degree. In academia, it is not uncommon to be conditioned to follow a narrow career path. But, just imagine what our world would look like if more arts administrators were MFAs or Ph.D. Imagine what it would look like if those on grant panels were working artists and not reps from corporations. Imagine if the majority of teachers in dance studios had MFAs. As other bloggers have said, you won’t be rich, but none of us go this direction for the money. So get creative about what you could do, because the possibilities are endless!

Dr. Alexis Weisbord received her BFA in Dance from University of Minnesota and her PhD in Critical Dance Studies from UC Riverside. Alexis was a competitive dancer in high school and later spent over ten years directing dance competitions throughout the US. Her dissertation was entitled “Redefining Dance: Competition Dance in the United States” and she has a chapter, “Defining Dance, Creating Commodity: The Rhetoric of So You Think You Can Dance,” in the forthcoming Oxford Handbook of Dance and the Popular Screen. Alexis has held positions as Lecturer in Global Studies at UC Riverside and Associate Faculty in Dance at Norco College. Currently she is an Associate Faculty member at Mt. San Jacinto College, Managing Director for The PGK Dance Project in San Diego, and founder/co-director of an emerging dance company, Alias Movement.

Links We Like!

by Lydia Links We Like

It’s Finally Friday!

Here is a little something to kick-start your weekend!

Find out which career you should really have!

http://www.buzzfeed.com/ashleyperez/what-career-should-you-have

What State Do You Actually Belong In?

http://www.buzzfeed.com/awesomer/what-state-do-you-actually-belong-in

Russian Mother Takes Magical Pictures of Her Two Kids With Animals On Her Farm

http://www.boredpanda.com/animal-children-photography-elena-shumilova/

Dad struggled to put your kid’s hair up in a pony tail,best way

“Let It Go” from Frozen according to Google Translate

And here is a cute picture of a seal!

Have a great weekend everybody!

Eat Well Wednesday

by Lydia Eat Well Wednesday Uncategorized

Cabbage is such a wonderful vegetable and often forgotten about. Not only is it full of fiber, it is also a great detoxifier and gets the blood moving and circulating throughout the body. Cabbage is also very affordable, one of the most cost friendly vegetables out there, so don’t miss out on this refreshing citrus cabbage salad. Your wallet and your waist line will thank you!

In an effort to get more cabbage in our diets, I made this dish………

Citrus Cabbage Salad

Looks Yummy, huh? Gather up these ingredients and follow these simple directions to make your own nutrient-dense, refreshing salad.

Ingredients

1/2 large Head of Red cabbage

1 medium Orange

1 tablespoon Olive Oil

1 tablespoon Apple cider vinegar

1 tablespoon Lemon juice

Dash Chili powder

Directions

Step 1 Slice cabbage as finely as possible.

Step 2 Peel orange and slice into 1/2 inch segments.

Step 3 Add cabbage and orange slices to large bowl. Toss with olive oil, apple cider vinegar, lemon juice, and a dash of chili powder.

Step 4 Let sit in the fridge for a while to marinate or serve immediately.

The ingredients are simple and besides the red cabbage, probably already in your fridge/pantry.

If you use a whole head of cabbage, it makes a ton of salad, so I suggest making it for your next potluck and share with friends.

Eat Well. Live Well. Be Well.

Jill Wentworth is leading us Wednesday by Wednesday into making better food choices and being more healthful. Tune in every Wednesday to get some great recipes and advice from someone who really knows health. In an effort to fuel her passion to serve as well has enhance the lives of others through their nutritional choices, she started Eat Well SA(San Antonio). Her vision is to educate you on how to incorporate a healthy array of foods into your life. Eat Well is not a diet, nor does it embrace any one specific dietary agenda. She also offers customized programs that are educational and teach you the tools you need to maintain healthy, well balanced eating for your busy lives.

Tuesday Tunes: Gregory Hines

by Lydia Tuesday Tunes

Gregory Hines!

Born in New York City to Maurice Hines Sr. and Alma Hines, Gregory Hines began tapping when he was two years old, and began dancing semi-professionally at the age of five. Since then, he and his older brother Maurice performed together, studying with choreographer Henry LeTang. Gregory and Maurice also learned from veteran tap dancers such as Howard Sims and The Nicholas Brothers whenever they performed in the same venues. The two brothers were known as “The Hines Kids”, making nightclub appearances, and later as “The Hines Brothers”. When their father joined the act as a drummer,the name changed again in 1963 to “Hines, Hines, and Dad”.

Hines performed as the lead singer and musician in a rock band called Severance in the year of 1975-1976 based in Venice, California. Severance was one of the house bands at an original music club called Honky Hoagies Handy Hangout, otherwise known as the 4H Club. In 1986, he sang a duet with Luther Vandross, entitled “There’s Nothing Better Than Love”, which reached the No. 1 position on the Billboard R&B charts.

Hines made his movie debut in Mel Brooks’s History of the World, Part 1. Critics took note of Hines’s comedic charm, and he later appeared in such movies as The Cotton Club, White Nights alongside Mikhail Baryshnikov, Running Scared, Tap and Waiting to Exhale. On television, he starred in his own series in 1997 called The Gregory Hines Show on CBS, as well as in the recurring role of Ben Doucette on Will & Grace. In 1999, Hines made his return to television with Nick Jr.’s Little Bill, as the voice of Big Bill in which he won an Emmy Award for Outstanding Performer In An Animated Program.

Hines made his Broadway debut with his brother in The Girl in Pink Tights in 1954. He earned Tony Award nominations for Eubie! (1979), Comin’ Uptown (1980) and Sophisticated Ladies (1981), and won the Tony Award and Drama Desk Award for Jelly’s Last Jam (1992) and the Theatre World Award for Eubie!. In 1989, Gregory Hines created “Gregory Hines’ Tap Dance in America,” which he also hosted. The PBS special featured seasoned tap dancers such as Savion Glover and Bunny Briggs. He also co-hosted the Tony Awards ceremony in 1995 and 2002.

In 1990, Hines visited with his idol, Sammy Davis, Jr., as he was dying of throat cancer, unable to speak. After Davis died, an emotional Hines spoke at Davis’s funeral of how Sammy had made a gesture to him, “as if passing a basketball … and I caught it.” Hines spoke of the honor that Sammy thought that Hines could carry on from where he left off.

Hines was an avid improviser. He did a lot of improvisation of tap steps, tap sounds, and tap rhythms alike. His improvisation was like that of a drummer, doing a solo and coming up with all sorts of rhythms. He also improvised the phrasing of a number of tap steps that he would come up with, mainly based on sound produced. A laid back dancer, he usually wore nice pants and a loose-fitting shirt. Although he inherited the roots and tradition of the black rhythmic tap, he also influenced the new black rhythmic tap, as a proponent. “‘He purposely obliterated the tempos,’ wrote tap historian Sally Sommer, ‘throwing down a cascade of taps like pebbles tossed across the floor. In that moment, he aligned tap with the latest free-form experiments in jazz and new music and postmodern dance.'”

Throughout his career, Hines wanted to and continued to be an advocate for tap in America. In 1988, he successfully petitioned the creation of National Tap Dance Day, which is now celebrated in 40 cities in the United States. It is also celebrated in eight other nations. Gregory Hines was on the Board of Directors of Manhattan Tap, he was a member of the Jazz Tap Ensemble, and a member of the American Tap Foundation (formerly the American Tap Dance Orchestra). He was a good teacher, influencing tap dance artists Savion Glover, Dianne Walker, Ted Levy, and Jane Goldberg.

In an interview with The New York Times in 1988, Hines said that everything he did was influenced by his dancing–“my singing, my acting, my lovemaking, my being a parent.

Hines died of liver cancer at 57, on August 9, 2003, en route to hospital from his home in Los Angeles. He had been diagnosed with the disease more than a year earlier but had informed only his closest friends. At the time of his death, he was engaged to Negrita Jayde. Hines is interred at Saint Volodymyr’s Ukrainian Orthodox Cemetery in Oakville, Ontario, Canada, the country in which he met Negrita. Negrita, who died in 2009, is buried next to him.

Gregory Hines Solo Tap Scene White Nights

Fit As A Fiddle: Steve Martin & Gregory Hines

Gregory and Maurice Hines in the Cotton Club

Fun Facts about Mr. Gregory Hines

He and Maurice Hines were cast as brothers in Francis Ford Coppola’s The Cotton Club (1984), set in the Harlem club where their grandmother had been one of the elite black entertainers performing for a whites-only audience in the twenties and thirties. Coppola encouraged the brothers to improvise so they based one scene on their real-life reunion in “Eubie!” and admitted the tears were real.

In the late ’60s he decided to try his hand at performing rock ‘n’ roll music, and writing his own songs.

Was aged six when he and brother Maurice Hines performed, as the Hines Kids, at the Apollo Theatre in Harlem.

Had his professional debut when only 5 years old.

When he was in his twenties he worked on a farm.

Was considered for the part of “Winston Zeddemore” in Ghostbusters (1984).

Hines made his feature film debut in Mel Brooks’ History of the World: Part I (1981). He was a last minute replacement for Richard Pryor, who had to cancel his appearance in the movie due to his freebasing accident.

Won Broadway’s 1992 Tony Award as Best Actor (Musical) for “Jelly’s Last Jam,” for which he also shared a Best Choreographer nomination with Hope Clarke and Ted L. Levy. He was also nominated for Tonys three other times: as Best Actor (Featured Role – Musical) in 1979 for “Eubie!”, which he recreated in the television version with the same title, Eubie! (1981); ; and as Best Actor (Musical), in 1980 for “Comin’ Uptown” and in 1981 for “Sophisticated Ladies.”

In 1954 he and brother Maurice Hines they were cast in the Broadway musical “The Girl in the Pink Tights”.

He had a reunion with brother Maurice Hines when they were both hired for the Broadway musical, “Eubie!” in 1978. It earned him a Tony nomination, as did his role in another musical, “Sophisticated Ladies”.

His own stage show took him from New York’s Bottom Line to spots as far-flung as Atlantic City, Las Vegas, Japan and Monte Carlo.

Inducted into the International Tap Dance Hall of Fame in 2004.

MFA Monday!

by Lydia MFA Mondays

Hi Framers, Happy Monday!

MFA Monday typically centers on musings from local holders of Master of Fine Arts, but for this series we’ve got something a little different! For the next three weeks we will get to hear from a contributor all the way from California…drrrrum rrrolll please:

Part 1 of 3

As I sit here trying to figure out how to start writing about my experience in graduate school, I am becoming keenly aware of my many mixed feelings about my time there and my time since. So here is to hoping that whatever comes out here makes some sort of sense, for me if no one else.

First let me say that if I could go back and do it all again, I would have waited a few years after undergrad before going to graduate school. I started my doctorate at age 22, immediately after completing my BFA. A lot happened in the subsequent five years of my life while I was in school and working on my dissertation. Your early twenties are incredibly formative years, but I wouldn’t know because I spent them ALL in school. So all I know is how formative graduate school can be.

The moment I learned that a field called “Dance Studies” existed, something in me shifted. Growing up with parents who were teachers and in an academically rigorous community, I have always enjoyed traditional learning. But dance was always my passion. Until college, I thought the two things existed separately.

Although I have danced since I was a child, I’ve never thought of myself as much of an artist. When I was given the choice to write a thesis or choreograph a concert for my Senior Project in undergrad, I only considered the concert option for about 15 seconds. I wanted to write. I was interested in the research process and wanted to be a part of something that blew people’s minds the way Dance Studies did for me when I was 19. After dancing and thinking separately for two decades, I was excited to discover a place where both worked together. I’m not suggesting that choreographing and performing doesn’t require both activities simultaneously, because it certainly does. For me, growing up dancing meant just replicating with no thinking. And while I logically understand that both can, and do, happen in the same body at the same time, I am not sure I have ever fully understood how to make that happen for myself. Even to this day, I don’t fancy myself much of an artist and am incredibly insecure about my own artistic process and choreographic product. But give me a page and I will write! Give me an inspired theoretical text and I will happily analyze movement! In fact, at my going away party before I moved for grad school, I remember a conversation with a dear girlfriend and brilliant choreographer. She couldn’t quite understand why I was choosing to subject myself to even more schooling immediately after graduation. I remember telling her, “I want to be able to write about what you do. I want help people know it exists and remember that it exists for the rest of time.” So when I was 22, that was my plan: To write. About dance. Beyond that, I had no idea what graduate school and a doctorate in dance meant. This should have been my first clue…

I was excited for the letters after my name. I was excited because it sounded cool. But, frankly, the whole thing was hardly planned. I applied because it came recommended from a trusted mentor and I didn’t have any other plans. I honestly didn’t think I’d get in. In retrospect, I wish I hadn’t. I wish I could have taken an extra year to work, even if it meant working as a caterer, to think about life, about myself, and what I wanted in my future. I could have read more, increased my vocabulary, and written more. I would have interacted with more people, learn what life was like outside of that of a full-time student, and simply enjoyed a moment in my 20s before real life became too permanent and demanding.

I think that year in between would have helped me avoid the panic attack I had the third week of classes. Towards the end of a seminar, in a small and crowded room, after trying to stay calm for several weeks, the realization that I simply had no idea what I was doing came flooding over me. It turns out everyone in graduate programs are REALLY smart (usually). It’s like having a class full of only the smart kids that raise their hands. Let me clarify, it’s not “like” that, it is that. This is really intimidating for the quiet 22 year old who is keenly aware of her own inexperience. So in that moment, I couldn’t figure out why I’d moved away from everything I knew. I couldn’t figure out how I came to sit in a room with so many people who were so much smarter than me. I was convinced that I’d never succeed, that I’d possibly even truly fail for the first time ever. Suddenly, the classroom door got farther and farther away, the tears welled up and I realized that I would not get through graduate school without crying in public…

Now, I’m not suggesting that a year serving food and working for minimum wage would have kept me from crying in graduate school, but I do think it would have made me more confident and more self-assured. I think I could have come in with a better perspective of the world and not one developed solely from books and research. Or maybe even a master’s program would have helped. I thought I was on the fast-track because I was special, smarter than the average bear. And I might have been. But no matter how good I felt when I got that acceptance letter, no matter how smart I may have been in undergrad, I found myself in a room with a collection of people that still, to this day, are the smartest people I know, with more experience, more knowledge, and more skill than I had in that moment. If there is one thing I am confident in in life, it’s my intelligence. But graduate school is NOT real life. These people were/are really brilliant. I was too inexperienced to have confidence in my own intelligence in that moment (and many more to follow).

The one thing I wish someone had told me before I went to school was: “Wait, not yet, maybe next year.” Graduate school is only what you make of it, so be sure you have all the tools and resources you might need to get the most out of it. It’s like trying to paint the walls before you’ve done the primer. It’ll get done, but the color could be sharper and last longer if you prime it first.

Stay tuned for more from Dr. Alexis Weisbord!

Dr. Alexis A. Weisbord received her BFA in Dance from University of Minnesota and her PhD in Critical Dance Studies from UC Riverside. Alexis was a competitive dancer in high school and later spent over ten years directing dance competitions throughout the US. Her dissertation was entitled “Redefining Dance: Competition Dance in the United States” and she has a chapter, “Defining Dance, Creating Commodity: The Rhetoric of So You Think You Can Dance,” in the forthcoming Oxford Handbook of Dance and the Popular Screen. Alexis has held positions as Lecturer in Global Studies at UC Riverside and Associate Faculty in Dance at Norco College. Currently she is an Associate Faculty member at Mt. San Jacinto College, Managing Director for The PGK Dance Project in San Diego, and founder/co-director of an emerging dance company, Alias Movement.