Confluences | Centre for Theatre, Dance & Performance Studies

Confluences 11 - 2025

DANCING CARE, COMMUNITY & PEACE EDUCATION

8 & 9 September 2025

The Centre for Theatre, Dance & Performance Studies at UCT continues to investigate Performance in its context of diverse cultural bodies and the challenges and opportunities of new technologies.

Segregationist politics remind us daily of difference. When attending a dance performance, class or workshop how do we witness our tribe? Is ‘tribe’ a dirty word unusable in contexts of contemporary global intersections? Resonating with US-based Somatic Movement Therapist and scholar, Martha Eddy (2017) this conference seeks to share multiple understandings of the notion of Care, Community and Peace Education in Dance.

It seeks to engage in a critical enquiry of values housed in Dance makers, companies, organisations, studios, choreographers, dancers and the complex negotiations of the specific interests of the communities they serve. This return to a face-to-face conference aims to push past the post-COVID 19 environment which has seen a return to and reinvention of some performance spaces. New dance alliances have formed and some pathways to collaboration have faded away. How is the notion of care, well-being and mental health in a world of Dance being explored by the diverse roleplayers including therapists, nutritionists and caregivers today?

How is a notion of ‘Peace Education in Dance’ investigated and unpacked by practitioners in Dance (incl. artists, teachers and researchers). Finally , how can the role of critics, Insta-writers, creatives and influencers of Dance shape discourses surrounding Care, Community and Peace Education?

Some of the key research questions which we hope Confluences 11 will begin to address include:

What are some of the strategies deployed to build a cohesive Dancecommunity when this notion is /not a central aspect of their dance praxis?
Is community understood as a target market, parochial, regional and/or global?
What are some of the lived experiences (Van Manen, 2017) in the field ofpedagogy and the benefit of embodiment made possible in Dance?
How is educating for Peace taken up by dance teachers?
What are the implications of Dance communities created as distinct silos? Or,framed differently, is this signifying a danger, to whom?
How do Community Dance programmes differ in deeply classist and racially divided cities and towns?
What do students, parents and managers today expect in terms of a duty ofcare?
When is the Dance teacher not your therapist/ caregiver?
Why is Care taking up so much space in the dance studio and classroom?

Registration:

Conference registration form can be found here.

To book tickets for the shows:

Monday (08/09) Lunchtime Performance : Words around the Collar - 13h30 - 14h00

https://www.quicket.co.za/events/332856-words-around-the-collar-confluences-11-sbondaba-dance/

Monday (08/09) Evening Performance : Neteshwar Dance Company and #1 Fragment QUI EST-CE - 18h30 - 19h00

https://www.quicket.co.za/events/332862-neteshwar-dance-company-and-1-fragment-qui-est-ce-confluences-11/

Tuesday (09/09) Lunchtime Performance: #1 Fragment QUI EST-CE - 13h30 - 14h00

https://www.quicket.co.za/events/332865-1-fragment-qui-est-ce-confluences-11/

Tuesday (09/09) Evening Performance: An Apprenticeship with Sorrow - 18h30 - 19h00

https://www.quicket.co.za/events/332868-an-apprenticeship-with-sorrow-confluences-11/

List of Papers and Venues:

List of Papers and Venues can be found here.

Proposal Submission:

We invite the submission of proposals which could be in a range of formats (including papers, posters, workshops, masterclass, performances). Your proposal must includea brief rationale and abstract (max 250 words) of your intended contribution. Please provide us with your name, institutional affiliation, email address and contact details.

Your proposal should outline whether you intend to make a joint presentation (max.30 mins) or individual paper (max. 20 mins) or workshop or performative experience (max. 60 mins).

We will endeavour, as far as possible, not to run papers concurrently in the conference programme.

Deadline for submissions: Friday 30 May 2025