MSP 168: Betsy Miller

Being part of the global dance community can be deeply rewarding but it also has the potential to be exceptionally challenging and toxic. Not only are you competing for highly limited resources, but you also need to contend with how your self-worth can become contingent on the opinion of others. Today’s guest, Betsy Miller, has experienced many of the highs and lows familiar to almost any dancer but ultimately counts herself blessed and deeply fortunate to have found genuine places of community within the dance world. Join us as we talk with Betsy about her early love of dance (and fashion!), her studies at Connecticut College, and how she uncovered her love of teaching while earning her MFA at The Ohio State University. She shares how establishing a collective with her former cohort allowed her to work in the collaborative models that would come to define her later approach to dance and how she earned her position as the Associate Professor of Dance at Salem State University, where she still finds herself today. We also learn about her ongoing american / woman dance project, and the circumstances that inspired it, before discussing how she chose to reorient the fundamental relationship between choreographer and dancer. For an expansive conversation on creative research, the beauty of being part of a dance community, and much more, be sure to tune in!

Key Points From This Episode:

·       Betsy’s early love of ballet and fashion and her discovery of modern dance.

·       The incredible faculty members and guest artists she studied under at Connecticut College

·       How she co-founded the Propel-her dance collective with her former cohort and friends.

·       How grad school helped her uncover her love of teaching.

·       How she became a tenured professor

·       The multitude of factors that led Betsy to start the american / woman project.

·       How she has used the american / woman project to interrogate the title subject matter and reorient the choreographer-dancer relationship.

·       Betsy shares the highs, lows, and biggest challenges of her career.

“It's always about community and the places in which I find community in the dance world. Something about the way that we bring our bodies into the spaces and that we are allowing ourselves to be vulnerable because we are embodied, makes this community really special.” — Betsy Miller

Based in Salem Massachusetts, Betsy Miller is a dance artist, educator and facilitator whose current mission is to collaborate with women-identifying dancers in every state of the country.

More on this episode: Movers & Shapers

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