Introduction

Abstract

The introduction traces the author’s path from dancer to critic to teacher, noting the serendipity and privileges of becoming a dance critic. While existing scholarship on dance criticism focuses on certain decades or individual writers, this book reveals constitutive relationships between critics and canonical artists, as well as the shifting roles of writers and publications. Focusing on dance criticism in the popular press from the 1920s to 2020s in the United States, Shaping Dance Canons introduces the concept of a choreographic apparatus to explain how criticism functions like a flashlight, highlighting certain artists and aesthetic values while rendering others invisible.