KZN DANCELINK, in conjunction with the University of KwaZulu-Natal's Drama and Performance Studies Programme (Howard College Campus), continues to support the education and training of skilled dance teachers in our region.

For the second year running KZN DANCELINK, in conjunction with the University of KwaZulu-Natal's Drama and Performance Studies Programme (Howard College Campus) has worked on a study programme that has helped train and skills dancers for a career in dance education and teaching. KZN DANCELINK has long advocated and worked towards an increased level and standard of dance teaching in this reason. Identifying a lack of skills in this arena and understanding the vital need for dance in schools as part of a fully rounded cultural experience, KZN DANCLELINK joined with Lliane Loots, the dance lecturer in the Drama and Performance Studies programme. Loots runs a graduate course in Dance Education which aims at assessing educational theory, cultural policy and the praxis of dance teaching in the South African context. The course aims at offering students the opportunity to skill themselves as dance educators.

Loots and Lynn Maree (chair of KZN DANCELINK) identified 15 potential dancers in KZN who would benefit from attending and participating in this course as a means to skilling a whole new generation of dance teachers for KZN. The 15 selected participants all came from a professional dance background many of who were already working in the dance education field by being part of, or running, dance projects in areas such as KwaMashu, Cleremont and Umlazi. Working with professional dancers offered an excellent opportunity to look into and question dance practice and learning. Debates often raged between participants around arts policy for South Africa, to how to best teach dance as both a career and for using dance as a methodology for teaching life skills. These 15 participants were funded by KZN DANCELINK to attend the course, and they were able to sit alongside UKZN students in doing this course. It proved to be a wonderful meeting of groups of people who understand and value the potential of dance to educate.

Report written by Lliane Loots 31 July 2007

LETTER OF APPRECIATION

We were delighted to receive the following letter from The National Creative Arts Youth Festival. ( Click here to view)

DANCE INDABA

In October, we held a Dance Indaba, at the Catalina Theatre, on the 30^th October, where Gcina Mhlope inspired us with a key-note address, and we then debated issues confronting both the membership of KZN DanceLink and the dance community in general. This proved very popular and was clearly welcomed.

On the 17th June, as part of The Playhouse Company's Hip Kulcha celebration of Youth Day, KZN DanceLink offered two works for the audience waiting for Ntando.
One by Thulebona Mzizi of God's Golden Acre, and the other by Mlekelile Khuzwayo.

IMBUMBA 2006

Invited by the National Creative Youth Arts Festival to perform our annual showcase on the stage of the Elizabeth Sneddon Theatre at UKZN in May, we pulled out all the stops with all our young dance companies, giving the professional companies a rest. Dance for Youth 2005 had been such a success that we repeated it for the NCAYF, and we showcased the work of our four commissioned choreographers: Marise Kyd, Musa Hlatshwayo, Mlekeleli Khuzwayo and Thokozani Makhoba, who each received a R5 000 grant.
In keeping with our mission to represent many forms of dance, Kantharuby Munsamys students came from Pietermaritzburg, and the students from Minette de Klerk Academy of Dance and Patricia McKintosh School of Ballet also performed.

INDIGENOUS DANCE SYMPOSIUM

Given developments, particularly in terms of subject matter for contemporary African choreographers in KwaZulu-Natal, as well as a call from the national Department of Arts and Culture for more funding for indigenous dance, KZN DanceLink decided that it was time for us as an organisation to debate the subject of indigenous dance, to consider for ourselves what we would call indigenous, and to develop our own policy as to how the organisation would protect and promote it.
The symposium took place at UKZN on the 16^th of September. It was for the membership of KZN DanceLink, but was advertised so that interested members of the public were able to attend. The keynote speaker was Vusabantu Ngema from the University of Zululand. Other speakers were Ntombi Gasa from Siwela Sonke Dance Theatre, Musa Hlatshwayo from Mhayise Productions, and myself, Lynn Maree. Some of the very fruitful discussion was subsequently fed into the Indaba.

The National Arts Council has offered KZN DanceLink R80,000 towards the rehearsals and staging of Giyani Lusha 2008.

KZN DanceLink acknowledges the financial support from 2005 to 2008 from the National Lotteries Distribution Trust Fund.