Dance Studies

The Dance Studies program at CSU Channel Islands centers around dance and movement as the embodied understanding of the human experience. Dance is where bodies–both individual and communal–find deeper connection to communities, social ideas, a complex global world, and human subjectivity. Throughout their journey at CI, regardless of ability or previous access, students will connect dance to heritage, history, and social structures, preparing them to be mindful citizens and dance artists, creating a more equitable world in the twenty-first century.

Careers

The Dance Studies major prepares students to find their own creative identities by harnessing their knowledge of bodies, cultures, and global awareness, to work in the interconnected spheres of Hollywood, Broadway, concert dance, digital platforms, education, community organizing, arts activism, dance making, somatic practice, dance therapy, social work, arts administration, and to embrace the joy of dancing.

Program Learning Outcomes

Students who graduate from the CSU Channel Islands Dance Studies program will be able to:

1. Develop an embodied practice for lifelong engagement with dance as a function of education, community, cultural knowledge, social justice, equity, history, ritual, and performance;

2. Adapt various somatic, breathing, kinesthetic, and mindful strategies necessary for building a life connected to dance practice;

3. Integrate the practice and embodied knowledge of dance to a range of 21st century skills such as communication, collaboration, critical thinking, digital/media literacy, creativity, and global awareness;

4. Reflect on dance as the primal form of human communication through which traditions and cultures are preserved and shared; and

5. Analyze dance as a continually evolving form acknowledging the origins, contributions, and confluences of African, Latin, Asian, European, and the Indigenous peoples of North and South America, and how race and racism, class, gender, sexuality, religion, spirituality, national origin, immigration status, ability, tribal citizenship, sovereignty, language, age, economics, and/or technology have shaped the way people move.

Faculty

Heather Castillo, M.F.A.
Associate Professor of Dance Studies
Malibu Hall, Room 118
(805) 437-2052
heather.castillo@csuci.edu

Bonnie Lavin, M.A.
Dance Studies Faculty
Malibu Hall, Room 117
(805) 437-8969
elizabeth.lavin-hughes@csuci.edu

MiRi Park, M.A.
Dance Studies Faculty
Malibu Hall, Room 117
(805) 437-8969
miri.park@csuci.edu

Contact Information

heather.castillo@csuci.edu
https://csucidance.cikeys.com/

Programs

Major(s)

Dance Studies, B.A. - 120 units