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                                What Influenced Katherine's Choreography?

In 1935, while still an undergrad at the University of Chicago, Dunham happened to attend a lecture by anthropological researcher,  Prof. Robert Redfeild. His idea that African traditions had been preserved within popular dances at the time such as the lindy, was very influential to her. She then questioned further; What if these cultures had been even better preserved within the traditional dances of Afro-Carribeans? This was a turning point in Dunham's career, when she decided to combine her love of anthropology and dance. After being interviewed by a committee at the Rosenwald Foundation, she was awarded a $2,400 fellowship to travel to the Carribean to do field work. One country Katherine chose to study while there is Haiti, which the video below exemplifies. It shows her interpretation of the meaning of some of their traditional dances and how she was planning to integrate parts of them into her own choreography. She also  did field work in Martinique, Trinidad, and Jamaica.



Credit: Library of Congress

 As much as Dunham was a learner and observer, she was also an educator. The video below was filmed when Katherine went back to Haiti in 1983. It is a good representation of some of the type of work she did in her later years. She was not able to dance much anymore herself, so she passed on her knowledge to others. Specifically, in the video, she is instructing Haitian dancer, Rachel Tavernier, how to perform the "rocking horse" while discussing her technique. It shows her style of teaching and how she interacted with her students. 

Credit: Library of Congress

In addition, with the help of this field work , Katherine was able to produce three anthropological films called "Shango", "Rites du Passage" and "L’Ag’Ya", which would become very influential to modern dance. These films were based almost entirely on traditional dances.  Katherine took influence from this by making sure to incorporate choreography that was bold and lively, reflecting the "ritual foundations" of the people. These films, as well as her other shows, helped audiences to take Caribbean and African dances more seriously as an art form.