Barbara Sellers-Young for the Gilded Serpent

The Gilded Serpent presents
Barbara Sellers-Young

Barbara Sellers-Young is an interdisciplinary scholar with an international research profile in the fields of dance, theatre and performance. Her interest in all forms of art and diverse performance styles informs her research on the moving body and globalization, which has taken her to Sudan, Egypt, Nepal, Japan, China, England and Australia.

Dr. Sellers-Young’s publications include

Teaching Personality with Gracefulness (University Press of America, 2002), a discussion of Kanriye Fujima's life and teaching of Nihon buyo (Japanese classical dance), and
Breathing, Movement, Exploration (Applause Books, 2001), a text for actors whose groundbreaking approach combines body mechanics and eastern and western philosophies to create a new visceral awareness of the performance process. She is the co-editor of
Bellydance: Orientalism, Transnationalism and Harem Fantasy (Mazda Publishers, 2005), which traces the impact of bellydancing from its initial introduction to the west through the writings of Flaubert to its popularity in the 1970s and 1980s in the wake of the feminist movement, and finally the globalization of the form in the 21st century.

Her research has been supported by fellowships from the American Council of Learned Societies and the Centre for Cultural Research into Risk at the Charles Sturt University in Australia as well as a Davis Humanities Fellowship. Other research awards include a Pacific Rim Planning Grant and a Video Development Grant from the Teaching Resources Center and the Japan Foundation Center for Global Partnership.

Dr. Sellers-Young was appointed Dean of the Faculty of Fine Arts at York University in July 2008. She was previously a professor and former Chair of the Department of Theatre and Dance at the University of California, Davis, where she taught for more than 15 years. She has also taught at universities in England, China and Australia.

www.sellersyoung.com

Articles on Gilded Serpent by or about Barbara:
1-17-10 Serena Wilson (1933-2007) A Student of Ruth St. Denis, Part 1: Childhood by Barbara Sellers-Young PhD
Serene Blake was born in the Bronx on Aug. 8, 1933 into a Vaudeville family of performers called Blake & Blake. Her mother sang and her father played the banjo. Her childhood and adolescent years intersected with the Vaudeville stage, on which she often appeared with her parents in the 1930s.

8-14-07 Tamalyn Dallal's DVD- 40 Days and 1001 Nights, reviewed by Barbara Sellers-Young
Thus, the film did expand my visual awareness. Now, did it deepen or extend my understanding of what that diversity implied? My response would have to be no.

3-3-08 Academics and Belly Dance, Two Books Review by Rebecca Firestone
Belly Dance: Orientalism, Transnationalism & Harem Fantasy edited by Anthony Shay and Barbara Sellers-Young & Choreographic Politics: State Folk Dance Companies, Representation, and Power by Anthony Shay