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The purpose of this paper is to investigate the organizing practices of a Lakota Sun Dance, and to contribute to the literature on rituals and ceremonies in organizational culture.

The researcher acted as participant-as-observer during this extended ceremony. Fieldnotes capturing observations and informal interviews with Lakota elders were the source of data as recording devices were not permitted on the Sun Dance grounds. Observations were conducted for approximately 45 hours over the course of five days.

The Lakota Sun Dance can be understood through organizational theory, particularly through a unique integration of the concepts of agency, loosely coupled systems, and just-in-time organizing. The current research highlights the role of agency in organizational ceremonies.

This research offers a thick description of the organizing practices of an extended Lakota ceremony. The integration of traditional Lakota organizing principles with modern organizational theory is absent from the literature, and offers a unique perspective on organizing from a non-Western perspective.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the specific field of arts entrepreneurship by focussing on the practices of vertical dance; a language of contemporary dance where dancers act on a vertical axis, moving suspended on the surface of buildings and walls. The authors’ focus on vertical dance as a meaningful corporal practice to explore the particular combination of dance and human movement, going beyond its purely metaphoric dimension.

The authors’ adopt a micro-social perspective, observing the practices (Gherardi, 2012; Nicolini, 2012; Sicca, 2000), that took place from 2013 to 2015 in the daily work of Wanda Moretti, a Venetian choreographer and co-founder of the company “Il posto”, observed in different contexts of artistic practices (Zembylas, 2014).

Deconstructing the overlapping dimensions that compose the space in our daily experience (force of gravity and the supporting surface), vertical dance clarifies how often we undervalue the complexity of the space and, at the same time, opens up the way for a better understanding and investigation of entrepreneurship in artistic fields.

The study sheds light on the way in which different categories, such as the human body, space, and movement, are a particular entanglement of elements, useful in highlighting some of the fundamental assumptions at the heart of the field of entrepreneurship. The heterogeneous complexity of space and bodies is emphasised, challenging its ordinary conceptualisation.

Este trabajo tiene como objetivo investigar el campo específico de las iniciativas empresariales artísticas, centrándose en las prácticas de la danza vertical, un lenguaje de la danza contemporánea donde los bailarines actúan sobre un eje vertical, moviéndose suspendidos sobre la superficie de edificios y paredes. Nos centramos en la danza vertical como práctica corporal significativa para explorar la combinación particular de la danza y el movimiento humano, que va más allá de su dimensión puramente metafórica.

Adoptamos una perspectiva micro-social, focalizándonos en las prácticas (Gherardi, 2012; Nicolini, 2012; Sicca, 2000) que tuvieron lugar desde 2013 hasta 2015 en el trabajo cotidiano de Wanda Moretti, coreógrafa veneciana y co-fundadora de la empresa “Il posto”, observado los diferentes contextos de las prácticas artísticas (Zembylas, 2014).

En deconstruir las dimensiones superpuestas que componen el espacio en nuestra experiencia diaria (la fuerza de la gravedad y la superficie de apoyo), la danza vertical aclara la frecuencia con la que subvaloramos la complejidad del espacio y, al mismo tiempo, abre el camino para una mejor comprensión y la investigación del espíritu empresarial en los ámbitos artísticos.

El estudio subraya cómo diferentes categorías, como el cuerpo humano, el espacio y el movimiento, son un enredo particular de elementos, útil para poner de relieve algunas de las premisas fundamentales en el campo del espíritu empresarial. La complejidad heterogénea de espacio y los cuerpos se enfatiza, desafiando a su conceptualización ordinaria.

Conventional wisdom holds that the art of dance is strictly and in all its aspects a phenomenon of the moment, something adequately captured by pictorial means only, and not by the written word. Reading and writing are thought to have little or nothing to do with the ephemeral magic of the art of dance. This attitude has its roots in a time before film and video technologies made more possible the vivid preservation of choreography; it also has its roots in a time before the importance of preserving our unique modern dance heritage became fully evident.

This paper explores informational dimensions of dancing by focusing on the cases of two folk dance groups practicing Mexican ballet folklórico in the US.

Thematic analysis of (1) extensive recollections from one of the study's coauthors, an academic librarian who was an active member of a ballet folklórico group; (2) an interview with that coauthor's brother, who is the current director of this school; and (3) instructional and demonstrative videos posted on YouTube by two US-based ballet folklórico groups.

Ballet folklórico dancers must use a wide range of information. The most important is sociocultural information, which expert dancers display while dancing and help novices acquire as enacted, expressed, or recorded information. According to expert dancers, sociocultural information becomes increasingly embodied through repeated enactment and constant interaction with ambient information. Specifically, ambient information provides parameters that both enable and limit the performance of the dance.

This paper contributes to the emergent Library and Information Science (LIS) literature on dancing and its informational aspects.

Well into the 21st century, it is difficult to deny the contribution that Mayan culture has made to the history of the world, and not only because of its contribution to universal culture with its architecture, astronomy and mathematics. Understanding the management practices of a Mayan dance (the dance of the Pochó) that has transcended over the years can give us an idea of the management practices carried out by an ancestral culture such as the Maya. The purpose of this article is to establish an initial conceptual relationship between the management process proposed by Henry Fayol (1916) and the management of a Mayan dance that has survived to the present day.

A specific ethnographic study was carried out in the municipality of Tenosique, Tabasco (Mexico) for two consecutive years. Research methods such as direct observation, researcher diaries, in-depth interviews and photographs were utilized that allowed a study of management practices.

Thanks to the cross-checking of the data obtained, it was possible to determine a theoretical-conceptual relationship between Fayol's management process and the Mayan dance studied. In fact, 12 specific management practices found in the four phases of the process were identified. In addition, with the ethnographic study it was possible to determine the levels of intensity and impact regarding the satisfaction of those attending and performing the dance.

Research limitations are due to result from the fact that the analysis corresponds to a single Mayan dance in a specific place (Tenosique) in the state of Tabasco, Mexico.

To understand the management practices of the Mayan culture through the study of a dance that has remained alive until our days; this might be useful for the management practices of today's companies.

It is a pioneering study that analyzes a Mayan dance through the optics of management sciences.

This article aims to bring together and demonstrate overlaps in three different areas of reflexive research concerned variously with audiences for contemporary dance. These are: 1) artists reflecting on their own creative process and engaging other researchers in doing so, generating new insights and language as a result; 2) humanities-based dance studies and a small number of dance scholars reflecting on this “process turn” in dance; and 3) the field of empirical audience studies, drawing on a single study specifically interested in access to creative process. The goal is to propose how these areas might coexist and mutually inform each other.

The approach develops a three-fold framework where the multiple definitions and examples of reflexive research in dance-making processes coexist. It draws systematically on a detailed example of one self-reflective study conducted by a dance company into creative process, on new scholarly writing on the “process turn” in dance research and written analysis of a unique audience research project as well as related literature.

In conclusion, the article suggests that in whatever combination of different research approaches, empirical evidence is increasingly important. This risks tipping the balance towards a more utilitarian understanding, particularly in the area of audience studies. It is possible to counterbalance this with approaches from artists and scholars interested in understanding arrived at through reflexive study of creative practice.

The original contribution is to bring these three areas together for the first time to expose difference and overlaps and suggest that challenges of understanding (in a non-utilitarian form) could be mitigated through more systematic dialogue between them, such as presented here.

This paper examines the perceived benefits of line dancing for a group of women between 60 and 80 years of age. It is based on a one‐year qualitative research study in Cape Town, South Africa. Line dancing has been classified as a form of aerobic exercise and this study sought to investigate whether these older women perceived line dancing to be beneficial to their health and well‐being. Individual and group interviews were conducted with 30 women and these provided useful insights into the participants' subjective experiences with regard to line dancing and the impact it had on their health and well‐being. The two broad assumptions that guided this study were a) that line dancing was perceived to be beneficial to the health and well‐being of these older women and b) that these older women did not subscribe to the popular assumption that there is a general deterioration in mental capacity, psychological or physical endurance or creativity once one reaches the age of 60.

The purpose of this paper is to analyze the strategy of performance art, especially Silat Movement (as a source and identity of traditional dance movement of Minangkabau ethnic group), as a marketing medium of tourism, especially in West Sumatera Province.

This research used a qualitative approach among six cases of dance. Quantitative method was used to collect data about the dance movement of Minangkabau ethnic group, which is in accordance with the cultural value that they adopt. The data collecting technique used was focus group discussion, documentation, observation and interview. The case study method was used to conduct this research, focusing on the Silat dance movement as a medium to promote tourism. The research method is presented to generate a study that is in harmony with the background and the problem statement. This was a qualitative descriptive analysis research with the aim of providing a comprehensive illustration of performance art as a medium to promote tourism in West Sumatera.

Minangkabau ethnic dance movement, which is based on custom and religion, includes movements originating from the Silat movement. Movements in Minangkabau dance include Silat movements, such as attacking and fending off, rolling over, sawhorse posture and leg and hand movements. This is an original movement source and derives from cultural movements born from the fighter. That is why the Minangkabau dancer is a male; females were initially not allowed to dance because the movements are not suitable for them. Movement stylization suitable for a woman appears when she starts involving in dance movements in Minangkabau. Given the basis of culture and religion, the concept of suitable movements for a woman involves having no pelvic-rocking movements, erotic movements (with legs, hands and head) or other movements, such as rolling over, fighting and fending off. When male and female dancers perform together, they are not allowed to touch each other.

The movement in the dancing art of Minangkabau actually should be in harmony with, balanced on and based on the value of Adat Basandi Syarak, Syarak Basandi Kitabulah, which is the philosophy of the Minangkabau ethnic group. This means, a religious value must be seen in all expressions of dance movements of the Minangkabau ethnic group; no expression should contradict the values of the religious and customs value. A similar perception to the philosophy states that it is very helpful for Indonesian choreographer for the needs of aesthetic from the rich of Indonesian dance. Also, Hastuti and Supriyanti (2012) state that it can be a differentiator from the dance rules of Western thought patterns.

Because I want the next generation of women to be set free from the birdcage of racial, gender and class stereotypes, a place from which my mother, grandmothers and great grandmothers never had the chance to escape, it is a personal and political choice to rupture the experiences of racial prejudice that bind us into phobic races within various shades of hatred. I am both digging a new place to find “truth” and criticizing an essential part of who I am or what I was taught to believe about our black and indigenous heritage. An epiphanic moment combines past, present and future moments into an act of doing and becoming. In honoring the first “queen” in my family, I wrote the following non-fiction children's story about my great grandmother Bernarda in three languages. Although I have never seen a picture of Bernarda, I feel her Chibcha blood burning inside of me and within every awkward phrase that I piece together as I fumble through grammatical structures, reviving memories into performative language. I wrote the first draft in English and later translated it into French and Spanish.

A central issue in contemporary dance ethnography is that of writing the somatic – the attempt to articulate kinesthetic, bodily sensations that emerge in a particular culture or context, within a research format (Ness, 2008; Sklar, 2000). Emerging methods including performance making and poetic, narrative, experimental, or performative writing create space for recognition of choreographic and sensory knowledges within ethnographic research.This chapter presents a case study that illustrates what I term “movement-initiated writing”: writing that emerges through dance making, wherein the dance ethnographer is a participant observer in studio practice. This emic approach attempts to translate the felt affects of a specific world of movement into performances sited in the terrains of pages. This mode of writing draws on Roland Barthes’ (1977) notion of the “grain of the voice,” Gilles Deleuze's concept of the “minor literature” (Deleuze & Guattari, 1987), Hélène Cixous’s examples of écriture feminine (Cixous, 1991), and the field of performance writing.