We use cookies to improve your website experience. To learn about our use of cookies and how you can manage your cookie settings, please see our Cookie Policy. By closing this message, you are consenting to our use of cookies.

Folk Dance: Grappling with Tradition – Call for papers

  • Start date: 11th Nov 2023
  • End date: 12th Nov 2023
  • Cecil Sharp House, London
  • Organiser: Vaughan Williams Memorial Library, English Folk Dance and Song Society
  • Website

The 2023 Vaughan Williams Memorial Library Conference, Saturday 11 and Sunday 12 November
Papers can be given in-person at Cecil Sharp House, London, or remotely.

We seek proposals on any form of folk dance relating to the theme of revival, reproduction, reimagination, re-creation, reformation, refashioning and/or reconstruction.

Papers may interrogate (amongst other things):

How researchers might go about reconstructing historical forms
Reconstruction vs reimagination in performance
How people have sought to revive folk dance(s) in the past and what it takes today
Traditional forms of dance in contemporary society
The presentation of folk dance in the theatre
Why revive? What constitutes success?
Do invention and innovation destroy tradition or ensure its survival?
Papers can be either historically focused or consider the contemporary context.

Proposals should be no more than 300 words long, and if selected, resulting papers will last c.20 minutes followed by c.10 minutes of questions.

Please email proposals to Tiffany Hore, Library and Archives Director, at [email protected], by 5pm BST on Friday 28 July.