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New
South Asian Dance Faculty Chairman
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| Amanda
Leon
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My
appointment as Chair of the South Asian Faculty presents me with a most
welcome and unique opportunity to combine two key elements of my life:
dance and education. I have accepted the position as an unexpected honour
and hope that I shall be able to make a worthwhile contribution to the
work of the Faculty and of the ISTD. I am particularly looking forward
to working with the Faculty members, many of whom are friends of longstanding,
who have gone out of their way to educate me about South Asian dance
and enabled me to enjoy its energy, intricacy and finesse. My education
is set to continue.
About
Myself
I am currently the Head of Student Support Services at Bath Spa University
College, which itself boasts a dynamic and fast developing School of
Performing Arts to complement its more traditional disciplines.
Having been a teacher in primary and secondary schools, it was South
Asian dance which gave me my first introduction to working in dance
when I joined the Academy of Indian Dance as Administrator. From there,
I went to work at Chisenhale Dance Space for five years as Project Co-ordinator,
where I collaborated with independent dance artists to promote research
and development, through training and performance opportunities. This
was followed by a period of freelance dance management working with
many independent choreographers and dance artists including Sioned Huws,
Rosemary Lee, Sue MacLennan, Kristina Page, Nina Rajarani and Nikky
Smedley. Since then, I have studied and worked at the Institute of Education
and worked as Director of Student Support at London Contemporary Dance
School. I am a member of the board of Yolande Snaith Theatre Dance.
Besides
my interest in dance and, in particular, innovation in dance, my principal
professional interests are in establishing widening participation in
all forms of learning; understanding and defining literacy and finally,
the development of higher education in the international arena.
The
Faculty
Clearly, following David Henshaw in the post of Chair, is in itself
a huge responsibility. For he, with the Faculty members, has done the
groundwork and set the parameters for the next stages in the development
of the Faculty and its working relationship with the wider dance community
as represented by the ISTD.
For
me, one of the most important and challenging aspects of nurturing South
Asian dance within the worldwide dance community represented by the
ISTD is the exploration of areas of mutual inspiration and creativity.
The South Asian dance world has an outstanding teaching tradition, which
has enabled many students in the UK to thrive in the confidence that
their teachers bring a highly disciplined and personalised training
to their work as teachers and artists. Equally, through the foundation
of the Faculty of South Asian Dance, they can now know that they are
joining with other equally strong and fruitful traditions as dance moves
to working within the framework provided by the lifelong learning model
- a model which is impacting so clearly on the ways we can teach dance
and evaluate it within an educational context.
There
are big challenges ahead, offered by our participation in the ISTD,
including increasing and widening participation in South Asian Dance;
building professional links with other dance forms working in the ISTD;
promoting and reviewing methods and aims of assessment; increasing the
profile of South Asian Dance; responding to changing expectations and
needs in the dance community and the wider public. I look forward to
being a part of these exciting steps forward.
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