The brutal encounters of a novice b-girl. Issue 2 (1st December 2018)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Dodds, Sherril
• Is Part Of: Choreographic practices. Volume 9:Issue 2(2018)
• Page Start: 233
• Page End: 252
• Publication Date: 2018-12-01
• Subjects: Dance -- Philosophy -- Periodicals; Dance -- Social aspects -- Periodicals; Choreography -- Periodicals; 792.82
• DOI: 10.1386/chor.9.2.233_1
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 2040-5669

Abstract

I am a 50-year-old novice b-girl and in this article, I examine how breaking has prompted ontological and epistemological shifts that move me literally and metaphorically. I reflect upon the brutal encounters of learning the improvisational technique of breaking as a middle-aged woman. In conversation with a practice-as-research methodology, I employ excerpts from my breaking journal, instructions and tips from my technique notebook, and a reflective voice that place 'doing' at the centre of knowledge production. From this I come to understand concepts of drilling, grit, flavour and cyphering, and I engage in alternative models of learning, collective pedagogy and community belonging. With a commitment to description as a mode of theorizing, I demonstrate how the process of learning breaking enables me to encounter the aesthetics and history of the b-girl body, confront my present identity position, and begin to reimagine the social and physical expectations of my body.