Other Resources > Bibliography
OTHER RESOURCES
The following list is intended to alert readers to existing resources and inspire continued research on the history of African American dance artists, especially those working in the ballet idiom.
BOOKS AND ARTICLES
Adamczyk, Alice J. Black Dance: An Annotated Bibliography. New York: Garland, 1989.
Adero, Malaika. “Black American Dance Narratives: A Survey of the Jerome Robbins Dance Division.” https://www.nypl.org/blog/2016/05/04/black-american-dance-narratives-survey
Allen, Zita D. “Blacks and Ballet,” Dance Magazine, July 1976, pp. 65-70.
Audain, Joselli. “The Marginalization of African American Ballet Dancers as Reflected in Dance Critical Literature 1980-1990.” Dancing in the Millennium An International Conference, Proceedings, 2000, pp. 124-29.
See also Deans, Joselli, below.
Balanchine, George, and Francis Mason. Balanchine’s Complete Stories of the Great Ballets. Rev. and enlarged edition. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1977.
Barnes, Clive. “The Extraordinary Achievement of Arthur Mitchell.” New York Times, May 11, 1975, D6.
------. “Shaping a Black Classic Ballet.” New York Times, October 13, 1969, D31.
Brown, Tamara Lizette. “Lingering Lights from America's Black Broadway: Negro Renaissance to the Black Arts Movement, African-American Concert-Theatrical Dance in Washington, D.C.” Ph.D. diss., Howard University, 2004.
Buckland, Ralph, with photographs by Jonathan Atkin. “From a Garage on West 152nd Street, A Ballet Company Soars to Moscow.” Smithsonian, 19, No. 4 (July 1988), 28-39.
Collins, Karyn D. “Does Classicism Have a Color? Even ttoday, Black Ballet Dancers Face Painful Hurdles—and Surmount Them.” Dance Magazine, June 2007. http://www.dancemagazine.com/does-classicism-have-a-color-2306861395.html
Copland, Misty, with Charisse Jones. Life in Motion: An Unlikely Ballerina. New York : Simon & Schuster, 2014.
D’Amboise, Jacques. I Was a Dancer: A Memoir. New York: Knopf, 2011.
Das, Joanna Dee. Katherine Dunham: Dance and the African Diaspora. New York: Oxford University Press, 2017.
Deans, Joselli. “Black Ballerinas Dancing on the Edge: An Analysis of the Cultural Politics in Delores Browne’s and Raven Wilkinson’s Careers, 1954-1985.” Ph.D. diss., Temple University, 2001.
DeFrantz, Thomas F. “Ballet in Black: Louis Johnson and Vernacular Humor.” In Dancing Bodies, Living Histories: New Writings about Dance and Culture. Ed. Lisa Doolittle and Anne Flynn. Banff: Banff Press, 2000, pp. 178-95.
------. “Dance Theatre of Harlem,” “Louis Johnson,” “Arthur Mitchell,” “Mel Tomlinson,” “Billy Wilson.” Encyclopedia of African-American Culture and History. Ed. Jack Salzman, David Lionel Smith, and Cornel West. New York: Macmillan Library Reference, 1996.
------. “Dance Theatre of Harlem: A Classical Ballet Company.” 100 Dance Treasures, Dance Heritage Coalition, 2012. http://www.danceheritage.org/dtharlem.html.
------, ed. Dancing Many Drums: Excavations in African American Dance. Madison: Unversity of Wisconsin Press, 2002.
Dunning, Jennifer. “A Dancer Who Had a Dream.” New York Times, April 14, 1974, 91.
------. Geoffrey Holder: A Life in Theater, Dance, and Art. New York: Abrams, 2001.
------. “An Uphill Path to 'Swan Lake': Visions of Ballet as a Multiracial Art Have Been Slow to Spread in the U.S.” New York Times, February 24, 1997, C11.
Emery, Lynne Fauley. Balck Dance: From 1619 to Today. 2nd ed. Princeton, NJ: Princeton Book Company,1988.
Estrada, Ric, with photographs by Sigrid Estrada. “3 Leading Negro Artists, and How They Feel About Dance in the Community: Eleo Pomare, Arthur Mitchell, Pearl Primus.” Dance Magazine, November 1968, 45-60.
Finkel, Anita. “Dream Dancer: DTH Prima Ballerina Virginia Johnson.” Ballet News, January 1983, 10-15.
Fisher, Barbara Milberg. In Balanchine’s Company: A Dancer’s Memoir. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 2006.
Gaiser, Carrie. “Caught Dancing: Hybridity, Stability, and Subversion in Dance Theatre of Harlem’s Creole Giselle.” Theatre Journal 58, no 2 (May 2006), pp. 269-89.
Garafola, Lynn. “A Conversation with Virginia Johnson.” Ballet Review 33, no. 2 (Summer 2005), pp. 51-62.
Ghent, Henri. “Dance Theatre of Harlem: A Study of Triumph over Adversity.” The Crisis, June-July 1980, pp. 199-205.
https://books.google.com/books?id=HioEAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA195&lpg=PA195&dq=Crisis+June-July+1980+Dance+Theatre+of+Harlem&source=bl&ots=9vcD7Xk_0r&sig=rcc4_RUr3V-uAkg2P853xYcfNjg&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjBgLiX9rnYAhUQMd8KHexGAlUQ6AEIJzAA#v=onepage&q=Crisis%20June-July%201980%20Dance%20Theatre%20of%20Harlem&f=false
Gladstone, Valerie. “Saluting Arthur Mitchell: DTH Celebrates the Big 30.” Dance Magazine, October 1999, 68-782.
Gottschild, Brenda Dixon. Joan Myers Brown & the Audacious Hope of the Black Ballerina: A Biohistory of American Performance. Foreword by Robert Garris Thompson. Afterward by Ananya Chatterjee. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012.
------. "Stripping the Emperor: George Balanchine and the Americanization of Ballet." In Digging the Africanist Presence in American Performance: Dance and Other Contexts. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1996, pp. 59-79.
Greene, Jonnie. “Classic Black.” Dance Magazine, February 1997, 85-91.
Greskovic, Robert. “Dance Theatre of Harlem at 25.” Ballet Review 22, no. 3 (Fall 1994), pp. 29-38.
------. “The Dance Theatre of Harlem: A Work in Progress.” Ballet Review 4, no. 6 (1974), pp. 43-60.
Haskins, James. Black Dance in America: A History Through Its People. New York: Crowell, 1990.
Hodgson, Moira. Quintet: Five American Dance Companies. New York: William Morrow, 1976.
Horwitz, Dawn Lille. “The New York Negro Ballet in Great Britain.” In Dancing Many Drums: Excavations in African American Dance. Ed. Thomas F. DeFrantz. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 2002, pp. 317-39.
Hughes, Catherine. “Poet in Motion.” Ebony, October 1968, 210-17.
https://books.google.com/books?id=RNsDAAAAMBAJ&q=Dance+Theatre+of+Harlem#v=snippet&q=Dance%20Theatre%20of%20Harlem&f=false
Jamison, Judith, with Howard Kaplan. Dancing Spirit: An Autobiography. New York: Doubleday, 1993.
Kaiso! Writings by and about Katherine Dunham. Ed. VèVè A. Clar and Sara E. Johnson. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 2005.
Kendall, Elizabeth. “‘Home’ to Russia: Dance Theatre of Harlem on Tour in the Soviet Union.” Ballet Review 16, no. 4 (Winter 1989), pp. 3-49.
Kent, Allegra. Once a Dancer... An Autobiography. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1997.
Kirstein, Lincoln. New York City Ballet. New York: Knopf, 1973.
Kourlas, Gia. “Where Are All the Black Swans?” The New York Times, 6 May 2007, A1. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/06/arts/dance/06kour.html
Latham, Jacqueline Quinn. “A Biographical Study of the Lives and Contributions of Two Selected Contemporary Black Male Dance Artists – Arthur Mitchell and Alvin Ailey – in the Idioms of Ballet and Modern Dance, Respectively.” Ph.D. diss., Texas Women’s University, 1973.
Lewin, Yaël Tamar. Night's Dancer: The Life of Janet Collins. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 2011.
Long, Richard A. The Black Tradition in American Dance. London: Prion, 1995.
Marbeth (Margaret Elizabeth Schnare). “Reach Out: Dance Theatre of Harlem in South Africa.” Dance Magazine, January 1993, YD6-YD8.
Marcus, Kenneth H. "'A New Expression for a New People': Race and Ballet in Los Angeles, 1946-1956." Journal of the West, 44, no. 2 (Spring 2005), pp. 24-33.
------. “Dance Moves: An African American Ballet Company in Postwar Los Angeles.” Pacific Historical Review 83, no. 3 (2014), 487-527.
Mason, Francis. I Remember Balanchine: Recollections of the Ballet Master by Those Who Knew Him. New York: Doubleday, 1991.
Maynard, Olga. “Arthur Mitchell and the Dance Theatre of Harlem.” Dance Magazine, Mar. 1970, pp. 52-64.
------. “Dance Theatre of Harlem: Arthur Mitchell’s ‘Dark and Brilliant Splendor.’” Dance Magazine, May 1975, pp. 52-64.
------. Judith Jamison: Aspects of a Dancer. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1982.
Mitchell, Arthur, et al. “NYCB and DTH: Anniversary Reflections.” Ballet Review 22, no. 3 (Fall 1994), pp. 14-28.
Nash, Joe. “Dancing Many Drums.” New York Amsterdam News, Oct. 30, 1976, pp. 2-11.
https://search.proquest.com/docview/226561702/fulltextPDF/E62441CC300445B8PQ/1?accountid=10226
Reynolds, Nancy. Repertory in Review: 40 Years of the New York City Ballet. Introd. Lincoln Kirstein. New York: Dial Press, 1977.
------, and Malcolm McCormick. No Fixed Points: Dance in the Twentieth Century. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2003.
Sandler, Ken. “The Black Barrier: In Major Troupes, a Minor Role.” Washington Post, 27 February 1983, K1/K5.
Shook, Karel. Elements of Classical Ballet Technique as Practiced in the School of the Dance Theatre of Harlem. New York: Dance Horizons, 1977.
Slater, Jack. “‘They Told Us Our Bodies Were Wrong for Ballet.’” New York Times, April 27, 1975, II, 1/19.
Terry, Walter. “Black Ballet Can Be Beautiful.” Saturday Review, February 27, 1971, 48-49.
Thorpe, Edward. The Black Tradition in American Dance. Woodstock, NY: Overlook Press, 1989.
Tobias, Tobi. “Arthur Mitchell and the Dance Theatre of Harlem: An Interim Report.” Dance Magazine, January 1982, 72-75.
------. “Talking with Karel Shook.” Dance Magazine, January 1973, 65A-71.
------, with illustrations by Carole M. Byard. Arthur Mitchell. New York: Crowell, 1975.
Turner, Renee D., with photographs by Moneta Sleet Jr. “Dance Theatre of Harlem Wows Russia.” Ebony, September 1988, 38-42.
Ullman West. Martha. “On the brink: DTH Men in Crisis.” Dance Magazine, October 1990, 43-45.
White-Dixon, Melanye P. “Marion Cuyjet: Visionary of Dance Education in Black Philadelphia. Ph.D. diss., Temple University, 1987.
------. Marion D. Cuyjet and Her Judimar School of Dance: Training Ballerinas in Black Philadelphia 1948-1971. Lewiston, NY: Edwin Mellen Press, 2011.
EXHIBITIONS
Classic Black. Curated by Dawn Lille (Horwitz) and designed by Jonnie Greene. Presented by The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts in collaboration with the Dance Research Foundation. Opened at New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, February 9-April 27, 1996, then toured to other venues, including the Gem Theatre (now American Jazz Museum), Kansas City; University of the Arts, Philadelphia; National Museum of Dance, Saratoga Springs, NY; Smithsonian Anacostia Museum and Center for African American History and Culture, Washington, DC.
Dance Theatre of Harlem: Forty Years of Firsts. Curated by Judy Tyrus. Organized by the Dance Theatre of Harlem, California African American Museum, and The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts. Opened at New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, February 9-May 9, 2009, then toured to venues, including Irving Arts Center, Irving, TX; National Museum of Dance, Saratoga Springs, NY; Fort Wayne Museum of Art, Fort Wayne, IN; Reginald F. Lewis Museum of Maryland African American History & Culture, Baltimore; Harvey B. Gantt Center for African-American Art & Culture, Charlotte, NC; Northwest African American Museum, Seattle; Ritz Theatre and Museum, Jacksonville, FL; California African American Museum, Los Angeles; Bell County Museum, Belton, TX.
WEBSITES
Balanchine Foundation Interview: Arthur Mitchell / AGON
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Asv8DaYoB90
Choreography by George Balanchine: A Catalogue of Works
http://www.balanchine.org/balanchine/03/balanchinecataloguenew.html
Dance Theatre of Harlem (company website)
http://www.dancetheatreofharlem.org/
MOBBallet.org / Curating the Memoirs of Blacks in Ballet
National Visionary Leadership Project / Carmen de Lavallade
http://www.visionaryproject.org/delavalladecarmen/
National Visionary Leadership Project / Arthur Mitchell
http://www.visionaryproject.org/mitchellarthur/
New York City Ballet (company website)
New York Public Library, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture
https://www.nypl.org/locations/schomburg
New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, Jerome Robbins Dance Division
https://www.nypl.org/about/divisions/jerome-robbins-dance-division
Timeline of the African-American Civil Rights Movement (1954-68) / https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_the_African-American_civil_rights_movement_(1954%E2%80%931968)