Skip to main content
Contribution to Book
Teaching Poetry Through Dance
Poetry and Pedagogy across the Lifespan: Disciplines, Classrooms, Contexts
  • Vivian Delchamps, University of California, Los Angeles
Format
Contribution to a Book
Publication Date
1-1-2018
Publisher
Palgrave Macmillan
ISBN
978-3-319-90432-0
Description

“Teaching Poetry Through Dance” draws upon the similarities between dance and poetry to recommend inclusive and innovative pedagogical practices. The chapter suggests that all poetry, but especially poetry that engages closely with issues of corporality, can be connected to dance, and that emphasizing this connection encourages students to engage with the written word in original and invigorating ways. Delchamps analyzes poems by writers Walt Whitman and Emily Dickinson, attesting that such poems take on new meaning when studied alongside videos of dance performances. She further claims that dance teaching methodologies help students learn to study a poem’s form, content, narration, and style. Students think differently about a poem when it is performed; Delchamps therefore recommends kinesthetic, visual, audible, and tactile exercises that work in various teaching environments and for students with diverse learning styles.

Editor
Sandra Lee Kleppe and Angela Sorby
Disciplines
Citation Information
Vivian Delchamps. "Teaching Poetry Through Dance" Poetry and Pedagogy across the Lifespan: Disciplines, Classrooms, Contexts (2018) p. 37 - 55
Available at: http://works.bepress.com/vivian-delchamps/4/