Experts Talk Mental Health: Four Therapists Sound Off

When Dance Magazine surveyed our readers last summer, 81 percent said the field wasn’t doing enough to support mental health. We sat down with four mental health professionals, each with more than a decade of experience working with dancers, to find out their thoughts on how mental health is being addressed in the dance community […]

What to Do If You Think a Fellow Dancer Is Having a Mental Health Crisis

When it comes to mental health, dancers are the ones on the frontlines trying to support each other. Many find themselves routinely confronted with concerns for their friends. Maybe it’s the dancer down the barre who you know is cutting, or the partner who only speaks about himself with disparagement and disgust. According to Dr. […]

Dancers Are More Intelligent Than They Get Credit For

Raise your hand if you’ve ever been stereotyped as stupid because you’re a dancer. Raise your other hand if that misconception boils your blood. Well, you’re in luck: One researcher is determined to set the record straight. Moving our bodies involves thinking, communicating and understanding the world around us. Photo by Maria Badasian/Unsplash Dr. Matthew […]

How Do You Find The Strength To Be Vulnerable Onstage?

In a sheer red slip—dirt-covered and exposed—the Chosen One frantically pleads with the community encircling her, wildly dancing until she at last succumbs to an inevitable death. Part of Pina Bausch’s haunting Rite of Spring, this solo is one of the most vulnerable in dance. “When I perform this role, there is no acting, my […]

Are Dancers' Brains Wired Differently?

Dancers are masters of multi-tasking. Performing a series of steps on stage while portraying a character and making a split-second change from a single to a double pirouette is no problem, but no coincidence either. Dancers’ brains appear to be programmed differently from non-dancers’ brains. Studies at the University of Maryland in partnership with the […]

Are You Too Obsessed With Dance?

At some point in your dance career, friends might have used the word “obsessed” to describe you. Perhaps you smiled in response. Priding ourselves on how hard and tirelessly we work seems locked in our dancer DNA. That’s partly because dancers need a certain amount of laser focus to make it in the competitive professional […]