DANCING ON VIOLENT GROUND: UTOPIA AS DISPOSSESSION IN EURO-AMERICAN THEATER DANCE by Arabella Stanger. 2021. Evanston: Northwestern University Press. 248 pp., 12 b-w images. $34.95 paper. ISBN 9780810144088 $99.95 hardcover. ISBN 9780810144095.

Abstract

US-) American modern dance history. Forced to contend with precarious institutional support, ever contingent upon competing geo-political interests, innovative cultural/knowledgeproduction in andaboutCuba is accompanied by many frustrations and disappointment. In a sense, Schwall’s offering exemplifies what artists/ scholars on both sides of the Florida Strait continue to struggle for: space to push forward the kinds of conversations across difference that are not openly had in othermediums. At the same time, the struggles with state partnerships chronicled therein might incitemore curiosity aboutdancing communities outside its scope. Particularly, those dance makers whose innovations can be credited to the extent that they have remained circumspect about the state as a reliable partner. General dance studies readers and Latin American dance studies readers, specifically,will certainly gain adeeper appreciation for the art of continuing todancewith statepartners as they change over time, andwhat careful comparisons can glean about the unequal footings within revolution.