Coming Up: School of Dance Book Readings

Please join the FSU School of Dance for book readings with two members of the FSU Dance faculty on April 20th at 6:00pm in Montgomery Hall, Room 215 and April 27th at 6:00pm in Montgomery Hall, Room 215. Dr. Hannah Schwadron, Assistant Professor of Dance History, will read from her new book The Case of the Sexy Jewess: Dance, Gender and Jewish Joke-Work in U.S. Pop Culture on April 20th before the opening night of Days of Dance! Dr. Jen Atkins, Associate Professor of Dance History, will present from her Jules and Frances Landry Award winning book, New Orleans Carnival Balls: The Secret Side of Mardi Gras, 1870-1920 on April 27th.

In The Case of the Sexy Jewess: Dance, Gender and Jewish Joke-Work in U.S. Pop Culture, today’s sexy Jewess moves boldly between neo-burlesque striptease, comedy television, ballet movies, and progressive porn to construct the 21st Century Jewish American woman through charisma and comic craft, in-your-face antics, and offensive charm. Entangling questions of sexiness to race, gender, and class, The Case of the Sexy Jewess frames an embodied joke-work genre that is most often, but not always meant to be funny.

New Orleans Carnival Balls: The Secret Side of Mardi Gras, 1870-1920 explores the relationship between identity and dance through the backdrop of secret society tableaux balls during New Orleans Mardi Gras, from Civil War to World War I. Atkins draws back the curtain on he origin of the exclusive Mardi Gras soirees that began after the parades rolled through, unseen by the general public.