Dancers move to Brazilian beats in The House that Ansiedade Built last weekend. The production, written and directed by Shelby J. Braxton-Brooks ’03, was the culmination of her senior thesis work.

Dancer-choreographer Shelby J. Braxton-Brooks ’03 did not have to suffer through printer jams and paper shortages to finish her thesis—instead, she brought a little bit of Brazilian culture and samba to the Loeb Experimental (Ex) Theater.

As the lights went up on The House that Ansiedade Built last weekend, 13 dancers and actors moved rhythmically to South American drumbeats against a vibrantly-colored patchwork background painted onto the Ex’s black walls.

For Braxton-Brooks, a special concentrator in Performance Studies and Performing Texts, her staged thesis let her combine her artistic interests as a dancer with her questions about “fantasized notions” of Brazilian culture in the Western mind.

But Braxton-Brooks’ thesis is a rarity.

Although many students profess an interest in dance—over 600 people enroll each semester in extracurricular dance classes sponsored by the Office for the Arts (OFA), and Harvard recognizes 18 student dance groups—the College offers very few theoretical dance and movement classes for credit.

Many active in dance on campus say they would like that to change.

“Most schools have a dance major or minor,” says OFA Dance Director Elizabeth Bergmann. “But at Harvard, dance classes are not for credit.”

Dancers say Harvard’s dance program—which is at a critical juncture with the Radcliffe Institute’s impending takeover of the Rieman Center for Performing Arts, Harvard’s primary dance rehearsal and performance space—deserves more.

Students and faculty say the dance program has come a long way in recent years, obtaining unprecedented success at the American College Dance Festival last year.

However, they say these improvements cannot be sustained without changes to Harvard’s curriculum.

Bergmann and students suggest the addition of a dance theory or history course to the Core Curriculum, and say Harvard’s impending curricular review may be an opportunity to add dance classes—both performance- and theory-based—to the course catalog.

Will Dance for Credit

Those interested in studying dance academically have typically had to apply for a special concentration. But Braxton-Brooks says there were just enough relevant classes for her to complete her concentration requirements.

Her advisor, Assistant Dean for Undergraduate Education and Director of Undergraduate Studies for Special Concentrations Deborah Foster, says Harvard could benefit from more performing arts classes.

“I think it would be wonderful to have a place for dance in the curriculum, perhaps with anthropology, history or folklore,” she says.