Parenting, Roma feminism, and dance: cultivating an egalitarian dance-research environment

ABSTRACT

This paper focuses on the working relationship between the director of an HE institute in the UK, and an artist-researcher navigating the higher education dance working environment and motherhood. The paper draws on personal experiences, sections labelled vignettes that highlight a tension faced by the individual and reflects on how the director of a HE institution in the UK facilitated egalitarian work environments through her charismatic leadership style. Such leadership from a senior female colleague allowed me to live out my Romani feminism and encouraged an inclusive work culture within higher education and the dance sector.

KEYWORDS:

• Motherhood
• dance
• charismatic leadership
• feminism
• Roma

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. Global Majority is a collective term that refers to people who identify as Black, Asian, Brown, dual-heritage, indigenous to the global south, and or have been racialised as ‘ethnic minorities’. https://www.leedsbeckett.ac.uk/-/media/files/schools/school-of-education/final-leeds-beckett-1102-global-majority.pdf.

2. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Edn6Dy5ZLHk&ab_channel=CHSSKent.

3. GRT Communities is a term used in the UK where Gypsy and Romani Gypsies form the largest group and originally descended from India. The term ‘Roma’ used at the Council of Europe refers to Roma, Sinti, Kale and related groups in Europe, including Travellers and the Eastern groups (Dom and Lom), and covers the wide diversity of the groups concerned, including persons who identify themselves as Gypsies. Travellers of Irish heritage consider themselves to be the indigenous population of Ireland. New Travellers originated mainly from the settled British population to seek an ‘alternative’ way of life. See: http://a.cs.coe.int/team20/cahrom/documents/Glossary%20Roma%20EN%20version%2018%20May%202012.pdf.

4. BME: Acronym for Black and Minority Ethnic. There are many different ways to refer to people from ethnic minorities. At the time of writing, Global Majority is the preferred term.

5. GTRSB in HE Pledge.

https://www.bucks.ac.uk/about-us/what-we-stand/gtrsb-higher-education-pledge

6. Europeana Space Project: https://www.europeana-space.eu/ Europeana Space was a three year project with twenty-nine consortium partners and provided an open environment for the development of applications and services based on digital cultural content. The use of this digital environment fostered a series of vigorous, wide-ranging and sustainable programmes where cultural heritage was at the centre of all of the project’s activities.

7. IN2: https://in-two.com/.

8. FCSH-UNL: https://www.fcsh.unl.pt/en/.

9. WhoLoDancE Project: http://www.wholodance.eu/.

10. Motek Entertainment: https://www.motekentertainment.com/portfolio-items/wholodance-2/.

11. SIBMAS: https://www.sibmas.org/ Since 1954, SIBMAS has been the international network of cultural heritage in the performing arts. The organisation is spread across 35 countries around the world, and gather individuals and institutions documenting circus, dance, film, opera, theatre and puppetry.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Rosemary (Rosa) Kostic Cisneros

Rosa Cisneros is an artist-researcher at C-DaRE (Coventry University) with a background in dance, sociology, gender and films. She works closely with several charities and NGOs in the UK and Europe and leads several small and large-scale projects. Her work aims to make dance and education accessible to vulnerable groups and ethnic minorities, and she also works closely with freelance artists developing ethical and equitable standards.