Hip-Shaking Required: Dance Programs Abroad

If my study abroad program had required me to dance for academic credit, I never would have graduated. My "dancing" is more aptly described as “lurching.”

But, for those of you who are not rhythm-impaired, there are some exciting new study abroad programs that will satisfy your yen for cross-cultural experience and let you shake your hips while you’re at it.

In Senegal, a summer program at the Ecole des Sables lets you learn the fundamentals of African dance from Germaine Acogny, a dancer-choreographer widely regarded as the “mother of contemporary African dance.”

After an initial week of classes on Senegalese languages and culture in Dakar, you relocate to a small fishing village about 30 miles south. Then the dancing begins. For six weeks, you participate in workshops on dance styles from Senegal, Zimbabwe, the Ivory Coast, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, among other countries.

This program is restricted to dance majors (the workshops are meant as intensive training sessions), but there are other programs that may be more in line with your expectations of a laid-back study abroad experience.

Amerispan offers a slew of “language AND…” summer programs that let you do, well, just about anything while studying a language abroad. Taking Portuguese? How about a four-week course on Portuguese and samba in Salvador, Brazil? Or Spanish and salsa in Antigua, Guatemala? Flamenco in Spain?

Whatever your skill level or experience, there’s no reason why your love of dance can’t be an official component of your study abroad experience.

Unless, of course, you’re me.
 
- Vanessa Quirk
Photo by Amy Thorne (from Up For Some Disorder, Anyone?)
 

Organizations Cited:

• Ecole des Sables
• Amerispan