Tapping the Margins: Feminist Research in Tap Dance History

Abstract

The research project Tapping the Margins was undertaken by Ann Kilkelly and Mary Neth from 1999 through 2005 and focused on women in tap dance. Their scope was unprecedented: to analyze constructions of gender, race, class, and sexuality in tap history. This article has a dual purpose: to detail the project’s materials, which will be accessible at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts and include notes for a never-completed book, archival video footage of dancers, film analyses, oral histories, plus stage and film production records; and to examine Kilkelly’s feminist, personal, and embodied explorations of tap dance history.