Dance Receives No Credit at Harvard

Dancing feet jamming to the music in a sweat-filled room is a familiar scene on a weekend at Harvard. The Office for the Arts' guide to Harvard and Radcliffe lists seven dance companies on campus. The Radcliffe dance program offers over 10 classes in modern dance, modern jazz, ballet, choreography and tap. The Harvard Summer Dance Program, for which students from schools other than Harvard can receive credit, offers more than 17 courses in dance, choreography, dance history and dance writing. Yet not one course with the word "dance" in its title is given for credit at Harvard.

Students interested in dance have looked outside academic classes to satisfy their needs. The Radcliffe Dance Program offers students the opportunity to pay to take classes throughout the year. Companies such as Mainly Jazz, Expressions and the Harvard-Radcliffe Dance Company provide opportunities for students to choreograph and perform their own dances. In CityStep, Harvard undergraduates teach children dance and theater.

Although there is no dearth of dance programs in Harvard's extra-curricular life, many students do not feel fairly treated in the programs which do exist, while others complain of the poor conditions under which they work. "For a university like Harvard, with the resources it has," said Anna Eberhardt '92, a student enrolled in the Radcliffe Dance Program, "not to have adequate space and a good floor is pitiful."

Harvard traditionally has held the view that "the arts were a sort of playground for the devil," according to Myra Mayman, director of the Office for the Arts. But with the coming of the American Repertory Theater (ART) in 1984, a debate ensued about whether to grant credit for performance. As a result, the "Bakanowsky Guidelines," named for Louis Bakanowsky, a professor of Visual and Environmental Studies, were established.

The guidelines required that for-credit courses be offered under "appropriate departments in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences (FAS)," have a "theoretical and/or historical dimension as part of the learning experience," be taught by a "skilled practitioner of the art," have "prearranged evaluation procedures and goals" and be taught by a "regular member of the Faculty holding a teaching appointment." As a result of these guidelines, only one course exists at Harvard even slightly related to dance. This class in movement, which is distinctly different from dance, is taught by Claire Mallardi, director of the Radcliffe Dance Program.

No Harvard Faculty member or administrator is willing to admit responsibility for the lack of dance in Harvard's curriculum. According to Jeffrey Wolcowitz, assistant dean of the FAS, "There are many things that we don't do and this happens to be one of them." According to Mayman, there is "minimal interest from within the Faculty and no one has tried to make it happen from without the Faculty." Mayman adds that it is politically not viable for someone outside the Faculty to make demands for a dance department.

Although Dean of Students Archie C. Epps III does not believe that dance courses were ever consciously excluded from the curriculum, the Bakanowsky guidelines have made their incorporation virtually impossible. Creating dance classes with a "theoretical and/or historical dimension" is not difficult. Students at Skidmore can take an entire course on Balanchine [director and founder of the New York City Ballet]. And a course in dance criticism at Wellesley requires the class to watch performances by the Boston Ballet and critique them.

The problem is that over the past 20 years, very few faculty members have actively encouraged dance at Harvard. In the 1970s, Arthur Loeb, Senior Lecturer of Visual and Environmental Studies, sponsored two House-based seminars on dance history. Unfortunately, these seminars received no funding from the University. Loeb taught the courses with Iris Fanger, director of the Harvard Summer Dance Program, but Loeb was forced to withdraw his support when he became the master of Dudley House. As a result, Fanger could not herself teach the course for credit because she is not a member of the Faculty.

Loeb also supported two student VES theses in dance, and when these works were performed, other undergraduates began to push harder for dance credit. According to Loeb, the response they received from the administration was "we don't do anything at Harvard unless we can do it better than anybody else." Harvard did not feel then it had the resources necessary to establish a strong dance department, and this bias has persisted to the present day.

Because no dance department exists, the administration cannot hire any faculty whose specialty is dance. Because the Bakanowsky guidelines require credit courses to be taught by a faculty member, Harvard's best chance of acquiring a credit course in dance would be if a prominent bio-chemist just happened to know a little ballet on the side.

For a University which grants degrees in music and credit for Sanskrit, it seems grossly unfair that not a single credit course in dance is taught. Student interest is overwhelming, judging from the number of undergraduates involved in dance companies and classes. However, the administration fails to realize the interdisciplinary potential of the art form. Not only is dance a performing art, but it has a unique theory and history which can be integrated with music, history and literature.

Unfortunately, it appears that the academic value of dance will not be recognized by the administration. Neither Harvard's position nor the Faculty's composition has changed much since Mayman accepted her position as director of the Office for the Arts. When Mayman first came to Harvard, she believed, "I would probably be dead before I saw dance for credit." Eighteen years later, her opinion has not changed.

Juliet McMains is involved with the Radcliffe Dance Program and CityStep.

No adminisstrator is willing to admit responsibility for the lack of dance in Harvard's curriculum.