Moving to the Rhythm of Africa: a Case Study of a Tertiary Educator’s Understanding of Multicultural Dance in Teacher Education

Abstract

Australia is proud of its rich and varied array of the Arts depicting a range of cultural diversity formed by ongoing migration. Although the complex issues of dance, culture and identity are interconnected, forming a multicultural society in Australia, dance education is a powerful platform to transmit and promote togetherness where understanding and respect is shared in dance practice. The focus of this article is on dance education as part of multicultural arts education within teacher education courses at Deakin University (Melbourne) Australia. It forms part of my ongoing wider study that started in 2010 regarding Attitudes and perceptions of Arts Education Students: Preparing culturally responsive teachers across two continents (Australia and South Africa).In 2011, I interviewed the dance educator and will report on two themes from her interview data: multicultural dance and the inclusion of African dance within multicultural dance practice. I argue that the inclusion of innovative and immersive practice of dance where authentic teaching and learning can be facilitated is a powerful platform to share multicultural dance practice in tertiary education.

Implementation of multicultural education through Sasambo Dance at the University of Mataram

“…In a study mentioned, one of the most diverse countries is Australia. In this study, it was revealed that Australia uses dance education as a strong platform to spread and promote togetherness (Joseph, 2013). Prospective teachers in these countries have been trained to have multicultural dance skills.…”

International Conceptualizations of Diversity in Multi-Cultural Teacher Preparation

“…In this review, a few studies engaged with biodiversity and global citizenship as integral to preparing TCs to engage with diverse learners. The seven studies involving art-based MTP approaches in this review involved ability diversity in dance (Østern & Øyen, 2014), multicultural dance (Joseph, 2013), multicultural music (Hebert & Saether, 2014;Joseph & Southcott, 2013), international and multicultural children's literature (Dedeoglu, Ulusoy, & Lamme, 2012;Strong-Wilson et al, 2014), visual and performing arts (Gouzouasis, Irwin, Miles, & Gordon, 2013), and film (Brown, 2011). This body of research engaged contextualized explorations of diversity as an interaction between self and other in specific time-place contexts.…”