[beliefshifter]

Hello,

I'm a lover of technical dance in general (have done 2 1/2 years of Ballet and Modern in U.S. and am currently in India studying the dark dance of Japanese Butoh) and am wondering if there are any notable dance programs known by international students for African Dance. I have stumbled on some, but I am wondering if anybody knows of any others. I've set for me a condition that I basically only travel the world to study dance.

As a segment in one of my Butoh performances, I will have a 5 minute dance influenced by what sounds to be a Ghana dance ritual.

[Paul]

Good question. Do you mean some kind of accredited course? I have spent time studying in Senegal, Gambia, Mali and Burkina and have never actually came across anything like that. It can be a problem if you are a professional performer or on some grant, the awarding body will want you to prove you are going to something official. There are dance companies all around and more established ones may have teaching contracts with US institutions/Universities, as such they may have a more formal and possibly accredited program. I would think Ghana would be a better bet as there is quite an existing link with anglophone universities especially in the field of ethnomusicology. I don't know if this a language thing or who decided Ghana is in and Guinea is out, I would imagine Ghana's relative stability added to the factor, and well the music is awesome.. I'm sorry I don't have any names off hand, I have friends who went through University to study drums though