Spectacles of Agency and Desire: Dance Histories and the Burlesque Stage

Maddie Leonard-Rose

Maddie Leonard-Rose was born in New York City and grew up in Brooklyn, NY where she began dancing at age 8 with the Elizabeth Streb Action Company (STREB). In 2009 she joined Dancewave’s DC1 and had the privilege of performing works by David Dorfman, Jawole Willa Jo Zollar, Nathan Trice, Twyla Tharp, Ronald K. Brown, Kyle Abraham and Andrea Miller. She is currently in her third year at The Ohio State University and is majoring in dance. At OSU she has performed works by Ann Sofie Clemmensen, Bebe Miller, Susan Rethorst and other MFA and undergraduate student choreographers.  She did not know before taking this class with Dr. Harmony Bench and Professor Nena Couch that she had an interest in burlesque, but conducting this research and working with these materials has been one of the most engaging academic experiences she has ever had. She hopes that you have as much fun reading it as she did writing it!

Contents of this tag:

  1. The Grotesque Body
  2. The Performance of Masculinity
  3. Thompsonian Burlesque
  4. Unruly Women
  5. Bawdy Women: Female Comics in Burlesque
  6. The Liminal Space of Burlesque
  7. Lydia Thompson in Drag
  8. Modes of Challenging Social Systems: Humor and Non-Normative Bodies
  9. Burlesque Theory: Examining Masculine, Grotesque, and Unruly Women

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