Students in the UCLA Department of World Arts and Cultures/Dance (WACD) believe that through art, we really can change the world.
Can dance heal, teach or save? What can this performing art do to make the world a better place? Plenty, if you share the unique philosophy of the dance program at UCLA. There is, in fact, something novel going on in Glorya Kaufman Hall, the campus command headquarters for an approach that is anything but the typical conservancy dance program.
For one thing, since a merger in 1995 between the World Arts and Cultures Program and the Dance Department, the dance program shares its space, literally and figuratively, with the studies of anthropology, art, art history, folklore, mythology, music and theater.
The UCLA Department of World Arts and Cultures/Dance (WACD) is interested in dance as an expression of human sociality — and its approach draws students who are as unconventional as their teachers.
WACD students may have learned to dance salsa in their living rooms, been part of the after-school hip-hop culture in their communities or learned ballet in a professional studio. Cases in point: dance majors Kaiya Gales ’15, whose work fuses ballet and West African traditional dance, and Kevin Le ’14, whose version of contemporary dance is “to infuse hip-hop and contemporary ballet.” Le explains that “I grew up with training rather than theories of performance and dance. Coming through the program, I learned there’s a whole new perspective of dance in terms of looking at it as an artist, innovator and creator of movement.
UCLA dance students are required to take dance beyond the walls of Kaufman Hall as a way to connect to the community through their work. They have worked extensively with LAUSD and have also performed for women’s shelters and prisons, armed with the conviction that art really can change the world for the better.
LEARN MORE ABOUT THE UCLA DEPARTMENT OF WORLD ARTS AND CULTURES/DANCE
READ THE UCLA MAGAZINE ARTICLE
GIVE TO THE UCLA DEPARTMENT OF WORLD ARTS AND CULTURES/DANCE