ASU dance faculty honored with education book award

The University of North Carolina at Greensboro recently announced the winners of the 2022 Susan W. Stinson Book Award for Dance Education, recognizing the work and expertise of several Arizona State University dance faculty members within the School of Music, Dance and Theatre.

The award-winning books were selected based on “assessment of the text’s originality, critical rigor, innovation, and potential contribution to the field of dance education with particular attention to books that engage, challenge, question, motivate and support dance educators across education sectors and diverse populations.”

The award was given to two books this year. One of the books is “Dancing Across the Lifespan: Negotiating Age, Place, and Purpose,” which was co-edited by Professor Karen Schupp, ASU associate director of curriculum and instruction, along with Pam Musil from Brigham Young University and Doug Risner from Wayne State University.

“Sue Stinson's research and work has laid the foundation for so much dance education research, so it is a tremendous honor to receive this award,” Schupp said. “Collectively the chapters shine a light on the different ways we engage with dance throughout our lives, and I am grateful to each of the authors who shared their experiences, research and work as part of this book.”

In addition to co-editing the book, Schupp authored a chapter on dance competition culture and co-authored another about parenting and dance. Current and former ASU faculty members were also involved in the book. Liz Lerman, renowned choreographer and Herberger Institute Professor, wrote the foreword for the book; and Mary Fitzgerald, ASU professor and artistic director of dance, and Eileen Standley, retired ASU dance professor, contributed a chapter to the book titled “Conversations on Change: A Project About Women, Dance, and Aging.”

The award was also given to “Rooted Jazz Dance: ​​Africanist Aesthetics and Equity in the Twenty-First Century,” co-edited by Lindsay Guarino, Carlos R.A. Jones and Wendy Oliver.

“Rooted Jazz Dance” features a chapter by ASU's LaTasha Barnes, assistant professor of dance. Barnes is an internationally recognized and awarded dancer, choreographer, educator, performer, cultural ambassador and tradition-bearer of Black American social dance. Her chapter, “Must Be the Music,” emphasizes the value of her family heritage and lived experiences in her movement style as well as the importance of focusing on embodying the music in jazz dance. 

“The greatest takeaway that I'm hoping for is a deeper sense of respect for genuine practitioners of this cultural form in all its presentations,” Barnes said. “This collection of experiences and methodologies, I hope, will impress upon future generations the critical nature of understanding and experiencing the fullness of a culture and its artifacts/manifestations. Many perspectives and experiences came together to create them. That must be our approach to learning about them and celebrating them as well.”