Program Requirements and Opportunities

ARTS

Students may complete a minor in Dance or Theater and qualified students may submit an application to major in Dance, or Theater through the independent major program. Students may complete a major in Fine Arts or a major or minor in Music at Haverford College. 

Courses in the arts are designed to prepare students who might wish to pursue advanced training in their fields and are also for those who want to broaden their academic studies with work in the arts that is conducted at a serious and disciplined level. Courses are offered at introductory as well as advanced levels.

DANCE

Dance is an art and an area of creative work as well as a significant and enduring human behavior that can serve as a core of creative and scholarly inquiry within the liberal arts. The Dance Program offers courses in progressive levels of ballet, modern and jazz, as well as a full range of courses in diverse genres and various traditions. Students may also investigate the creative process in three levels of composition and choreography courses. Performance opportunities available to students include the Spring Dance Concert, in which students work with professional choreographers or reconstructors and perform in our main stage theater, and our School Performance Project, which travels to schools throughout the Philadelphia region. The program's lecture/seminar dance studies courses are designed to introduce students to dance as a vital area of academic inquiry, and include examinations of dance theory, history and criticism, dance historiography, dance and embodied activism, and practical anatomy for dance.  

Students can take single courses in dance, minor in dance, or complete a major through the independent major program. The core academic curriculum for the dance minor or independent major in dance includes intermediate or advanced technique courses, performance ensembles, dance composition, independent work, and courses in dance studies.

Minor Requirements

Requirements for the dance minor are six units of coursework: three required (ARTD B140 and two of the three composition courses, B142, B242, or B243) and two .5 credit studio courses: one must be selected from among the following technique courses: 136, 137, 138, 139, 141, or any 200 or 300 level technique course; the second .5 credit course must be a technique course at the 200 or 300 level or selected from among the following performance ensembles: 345-350); three approved electives; and attendance at a prescribed number of performances/events. With the advisor's approval, one elective in the minor may be selected from allied Tri-College departments.

Independent Major in Dance Requirements

The independent major requires eleven courses, drawn primarily from our core academic curriculum and including: ARTD 140 and one additional dance lecture/seminar course; two dance composition courses (ARTD B142, ARTD B242, or ARTD B243); one 0.5 technique course at the intermediate or advanced level each semester after declaring the major. Participation in performance ensembles is highly recommended. The major also requires attendance at a prescribed number of performances/events, demonstration of basic writing competency in dance by taking two writing attentive course in Dance or an approved allied program or department, and a senior capstone experience. With the advisor's approval, two electives in the major may be selected from allied Tri-College departments.

In both the minor and the major, students may choose to emphasize one aspect of the field, in consultation with the dance faculty regarding their course of study.

Technique Courses and Performance Ensemble Courses

The Dance Program offers a full range of dance instruction including courses in ballet, modern, jazz, West African, and Hip Hop, as well as techniques developed from other cultural art and social forms such as flamenco, Classical Indian, Latin social dance, and tap dance, among others. A ballet placement class is required for upper-level ballet courses. Performance ensembles, choreographed or re-staged by professional artists, are by audition and are given full concert support. The School Performance Project tours regional K-12 schools. Technique courses ARTD 136-139, 141, 230-232, 330-331, and all dance ensembles are offered for academic credit; alternatively, all technique courses and ensemble courses may be taken for Physical Education credit (see both listings below).

Technique/Ensemble Courses for PE Credit (check course guide for courses available each semester)

PE B101 Ballet: Beginning Technique
PE B102 Ballet: Intermediate Technique
PE B103 Ballet: Advanced Technique
PE B104 Ballet Workshop
PE B105 Modern: Beginning Technique
PE B106 Modern: Intermediate Technique
PE B107 Modern: Advanced Technique
PE B108 Jazz: Beginning Technique
PE B110 Jazz: Intermediate Technique
PE B111 Hip Hop Technique
PE B112 African Diaspora: Beginning Technique
PE B118 Movement Improvisation
PE B120 Intro to Flamenco
PE B131 Tap: Learning and Performing
PE B145 Dance Ensemble: Modern
PE B146 Dance Ensemble: Ballet
PE B147 Dance Ensemble: Jazz
PE B148 Dance Ensemble: West African
PE B149 Dance Ensemble: School Performance Project
PE B150 Dance Ensemble: Hip Hop
PE B195 Movement for Theater
PE B196 Dance Composition Lab
PE B197 Directed Work in Dance

Courses for Academic Credit

ARTD B136 Modern: Beginning Technique
ARTD B137 Ballet: Beginning Technique
ARTD B138 Hip Hop Lineages
ARTD B139 Movement as Freedom: Improv/Freestyle
ARTD B140 Approaches to Dance: Themes and Perspectives
ARTD B142 Dance Composition: Process and Presence
ARTD/ANTH B223 Anthropology of Dance
ARTD B210 Sacred Activism: Dancing Altars, Radical Moves
ARTD B220 Screendance: Movement and the Camera
ARTD B225 Dancing Histories/Writing Dance
ARTD B230 Modern: Intermediate Technique
ARTD B231 Ballet: Intermediate Technique
ARTD B232 Jazz: Intermediate Technique
ARTD B240 Dance History I: Roots of Western Theater Dance
ARTD B241 Dance History II: A History of Contemporary Western Theater Dance
ARTD B242 Dance Composition: Elements and Craft
ARTD B245 Dance: Close Reading
ARTD B250 Performing the Political Body
ARTD B265 Dance, Migration and Exile
ARTD B267 Diasporic Bodies, Continuous Revivals
ARTD B270 Diasporic Bodies, Citizenship, and Dance
ARTD B280 Practical Anatomy: Muscles, Bones, Movement
ARTD/ANTH B310 Performing the City: Theorizing Bodies in Space
ARTD B330 Modern: Advanced Technique
ARTD B331 Ballet: Advanced Technique
ARTD B342 Advanced Choreography
ARTD B345 Dance Ensemble: Modern
ARTD B346 Dance Ensemble: Ballet
ARTD B347 Dance Ensemble: Jazz
ARTD B348 Dance Ensemble: African Dance Forms
ARTD B349 Dance Ensemble: School Performance Project
ARTD B350 Dance Ensemble: Hip Hop
ARTD B400 Senior Project/Thesis
ARTD B403 Supervised Work
ARTA B251/EDUC B251 Arts Teaching in Educational and Community Settings

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