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Introduction
Why choose this course?
Key features:
DMU is recognised as a Centre for Excellence in Performance Arts with great facilities providing specialist studios and rehearsal spaces designed specifically for dance and performance learning activities.
Gain industry experience and boost your exposure in the field through our excellent links with local, national and international dance organisations and artists such as Maverick TV, One Dance UK and Serendipity Arts.
World-renowned choreographer and DMU alumnus, Akram Khan MBE, is Chancellor of the university, reflecting our commitment to championing performance arts. Students recently went behind the scenes of his latest production at Leicester's Curve theatre, find out more.
Real-life experience is offered though placements and industry focused projects. Students have recently worked with Moving Together, Fuelled Dance Theatre and New Art Club.
Our graduates are creative, entrepreneurial practitioners who are able to respond to the ever-changing demands of the current dance profession. Previous graduates have gone on to a variety of work and performance opportunities, including a role as the head of dance, performing in music videos, and participating in Channel 4’s First Acts and Let’s Dance International Frontiers festival.
Benefit from the cutting edge research and practice carried out by Dance staff in the Research Institute of Drama, Dance and Performance Studies Research.
Benefit from Education 2030, where a simplified ‘block learning’ timetable means you will study one subject at a time and have more time to engage with your learning, receive faster feedback and enjoy a better study-life balance.
Overview
Intellectually and artistically demanding, this course offers daily dance classes in contemporary techniques, ballet for contemporary dancers, fusion (street, urban, hip-hop), improvisation and African principles.
Alongside developing an outstanding dance technique, you will acquire critical thinking, technical and artistic skills to prepare you for a range of dance-related careers. With a diverse and inclusive approach, the curriculum explores themes at the forefront of today’s industry and you can choose to specialise in areas such as education, choreography and creative media.
We have strong industry links, providing opportunities to engage with national and international organisations, work with local community groups and hear from visiting lecturers and artists. Employability and performance opportunities are embedded throughout the curriculum, with flexibility for you to develop your skills and personal interests towards your career aspirations. You will also benefit from great facilities that have contributed to DMU being recognised as a Centre for Excellence in Performance Arts, reflecting our commitment to innovative and excellent teaching and learning.
Modules
Year 1
Block 1: The Responsive Dancer
This module introduces you to a range of approaches for understanding, practising, creating and writing about dance. You will take part in practical studio-based sessions in dance technique classes, choreography for live performance dance contexts and academic skills. Dance technique classes in a diverse range of styles cover improvisation, anatomy, physiology and approaches to safe practice. Choreography workshops will introduce you to a variety of creative processes that support the making of your own live performances. This is contextualised by seminars that address diverse UK and global choreographic practices and an introduction to academic/research skills. You will also begin to develop an understanding of the current UK dance sector by examining some key support, development and funding organisations.
Assessment:
Choreography, 70%. Essay, 30%.
Block 2: Rethinking Dance
You will take part in practical studio-based sessions in making and presenting choreography for Screen Dance, dance technique classes, the study of national and international dance in screen contexts, and academic skills development. Dance classes in a diverse range of styles will begin to develop your ensemble skills. In practical choreographic workshops you will explore approaches that support making work for a screen dance presentational form. You will gain skills in both practical and creative uses of digital equipment and editing software to explore your choreographic craft. You will continue to develop an understanding of the current UK dance sector extending and start to build project management and team skills.
Assessment:
Screen choreography, 70%. Blog, 30%.
Block 3: Space, Place and Connections
This module focuses on locating your choreographic work in spaces beyond the studio. You will be introduced to choreographing collaboratively and presenting performance work in spaces that might include gallery settings, outdoor locations and spaces on/off campus. Working in response to the demands of your chosen space, you will build upon choreographic methods and approaches developed in Blocks 1 and 2. Alongside dance classes in a diverse range of styles, you will continue to learn about Dance in relation to wider social and cultural agendas such as creative and cultural learning, community development and health and wellbeing.
Assessment:
Classwork, 30%. Choreography, 30%. Group presentation and viva, 40%.
Block 4: Ensemble Performance and Production
This module focuses on the creation and presentation of an ensemble performance, co-created by all students with directorial input from a tutor. Ensemble, performance and artistic skills are embedded into dance technique classes and you will explore the skills and impact of the ensemble as it operates in a range of contexts such as duet, chorus, unison and contact improvisation. In making performance work you will gain experience of being directed, directing others and collaboration. The module also introduces skills in dance promotion and management that you will apply in the production of the performance for a public audience.
Assessment:
Performance and production, 60%. Critical review.
Year 2
Block 1: Style, Production and Artistry
This module continues to develop your skills and understanding of making and presenting choreography for live performance contexts and introduces production, artistic and stylistic values into the creative process. Workshops focus on the creative potential of embedding production values such costume, sound, lighting and the use of sets/props into your choreographic work. There is an emphasis on taking ownership of your artistic voice. You will explore a range of choreographic and performance contexts, that focus on how style, production and artistry are important in generating meaning in choreographic work.
Assessment:
Choreography, 60%. Critical Reflection and Context, 40%.
Block 2: Applying Your Practice: Dance Artists, Communities and Education
This module introduces the practice of dance artists working in community and educational settings. You will explore the role of dance artists as contributors to education in both formal and informal contexts, as dance leaders in a range of community settings and as artists making work with a range of participants. The module considers the contribution dance can make to physical, social and psychological wellbeing, creative and cultural education, the enhancement of health of the individual and to community development. There is an emphasis on using dance as an empowering tool for participants and audiences and employing practices that are inclusive. You will work collaboratively with their peers to create and realise a dance performance led by a commission and related to the needs of a particular community or educational group. Individual dance performance practice will continue to develop with a focus on diverse styles and theatrical and storytelling approaches.
Assessment:
Performance project, 50%. Group viva, 50%: 15 minutes.
Block 3: The Healthy Practitioner: Wellbeing and Self-management
In this module you will explore how to develop and maintain good health as a practitioner. Dance technique classes cover movement practices currently used by professional practitioners, such as yoga and pilates. You will develop your understanding of the contexts for these movement practices and their relevance to dance artists, developing your understanding of how to manage your own health and wellbeing, and that of others. Topics also include a basic general scientific background of anatomy and physiology, nutrition and prevention of, and recovery from injury.
Assessment:
Classwork, 50%. Critical reflection, 50%.
Block 4: Digitising Your Artistic Voice
On this module you will develop approaches for interrogating, interpreting, and re-presenting choreographic content in digital form. You will take part in workshops in the creative use of the camera and editing software and consider how location, viewing points, design elements and sound inform and integrate content. In technique classes, you will develop skills in duet and small ensemble work and also explore the artistry of teacher led and self-directed movement.
Assessment:
Screen choreography, 65%. Critical reflection and evaluation, 35%.
Year 3
Blocks 1 and 2: Select two from the list below:
Facilitating Practice: Teaching and Leading Dance
This module provides opportunities to gain practical experience in teaching and leading participatory dance activities. Students are introduced to a range of teaching and learning styles, strategies and activities for facilitating dance for children, young people and adults in educational and community settings. You will consider key issues and practices including features of effective practice, fostering participation, creativity and inclusion, planning and evaluating dance sessions and designing and implementing a duty of care strategy. You will gain practical experience in planning, delivering, and evaluating dance workshops and/or events with tutor guidance and supervision.Students reflect on and critically evaluate their own practice in relation to professional occupational standards of facilitating dance.
Assessment:
Critical portfolio, 50%.
Teaching practice portfolio, 50%: 1 workshop, 15 minute viva and supporting documents.
Industry practice: Choreography, Performance and Producing
This module emphasises individual authorship, technical execution, artistic interpretation, choreography and performance, informed by current industry practices. Practical sessions will enable you to develop your practice to a highly sophisticated level. Taught choreographic sessions deal with topics such as rehearsal and production planning and management, creative research and documentation and strategies for directing. You will also explore self-promotion, producing and entrepreneurialism to help prepare you for employment in a range of contexts. You will apply these skills in the marketing and promotion of your choreographic work for public performance.
Assessment:
Solo choreography, 30%. Group choreography, 40%. Marketing pack portfolio and critical evaluation, 30%.
Personal Research Project
This module enables you to lead an individual research project in order to explore an aspect of the dance course content and your personal interests in further depth. The module encourages the development of autonomous learning, research skills, preparation, planning and the communication of process and product. You will work independently with support from tutorials and group sessions. You can choose either a written or practice-based project.
Assessment:
Essay, 100%. OR Essay, 50% and Practice, 50%.
Education and Performing Arts
This module will equip you with an understanding of performing arts education policy, pedagogy, curriculum design, and assessment in a time of educational, economic, technological and social change. We will explore the place of the performing arts in the evolving English education system and in the early years, through primary and secondary and special education. In particular, the module explores the potential of contemporary performance pedagogy within the sector and encourages you to utilise your own contemporary practice skillset as methodology for your project work. Throughout the module, you will be introduced to key arts education theories including aesthetic theory, experiential learning, models of creativity and multiple intelligence theory.
Assessment:
Practical 1 and 2, 50% each: You will develop a creative ‘pitch’ to a school or educational provider.
Block 3: The Bridging Project
This module is designed to prepare you for transition from study into employment with a project that develops and supports your skills and career aspirations. You will identify a topical issue or debate within the current creative arts sector and deepen your understanding of it through appreciating and evaluating the activities of those working in it. You will engage with, for example, graduates, alumni, professional practitioners and/or creative organisations in the city, regionally and nationally from fields such as community arts, education, health and well-being, performance, choreography, marketing and administration. Activities may involve a brief placement, shadowing, observing and interviewing professionals, engaging in practical activity such as teaching, making and presenting work.
Assessment:
Critical review, 10%
OR
Block 3: Creative Media in Performance
You will learn a range of techniques and creative approaches for cutting-edge use of media and technology within performing arts, considering what the future of performance might look like. The ethos of the module is creativity and innovation aligned to emerging and cutting-edge creative industry practices. You will explore topics including technology as a creative agent, theoretical and philosophical approaches in the use of technology in creative practice and the aesthetics of composition and 'liveness' of performance. You will gain practical experience in planning, creating and evaluating the use of creative media in performance through exploring real-world prototypes such as Interactive Sound Design, Telematics and Networked Video-based Performance, Virtual and Augmented Reality, Projection Mapping and VJ’ing, Social Media and Gamification.
Assessment:
Practical, 100%: presented in a format of your choosing for example a power point, walking tour or installation.
Block 4: Dance Company and Production
This module builds on skills and knowledge developed throughout the course to experience the process of realising dance work for public performance, working alongside a practitioner or company. You will take on a particular role that might include performing, leading outreach workshops, marketing and administration, documenting, videoing/editing, lighting design and operation, costumes and stage management. The module is designed to enable you to develop your skills towards your career aspirations, supporting your transition into the industry.
Assessment:
Individual contribution to preparation, process and production, 70%. Critical reflection and evaluation, 30%.
Entry Criteria
ENTRY REQUIRED DOCUMENTS
Home Office Share Code
For EU students only.
IF no Qualification
Please provide CV with at least 2 years of work experience, and employee reference letter.
Entry criteria
Typical entry requirements
112 points from at least 2 A'levels or
BTEC Extended Diploma DMM or
International Baccalaureate: 26+ Points
T Levels Merit
Plus five GCSEs grades 9-4 including English Language or Literature at grade 4 or above.
Pass Access with 30 Level 3 credits at Merit (or equivalent) and GCSE English (Language or Literature) at grade 4 or above.
We will normally require students have had a break from full-time education before undertaking the Access course.
We also accept the BTEC First Diploma plus two GCSEs including English Language or Literature at grade 4 or above
English language requirements
If English is not your first language an IELTS score of 6.0 overall with 5.5 in each band (or equivalent) when you start the course is essential.
English language tuition, delivered by our British Council-accredited Centre for English Language Learning, is available both before and throughout the course if you need it.
Interview and audition
Interview required: Yes
Audition required: Yes
Assessment
ASSESSMENT METHODS
1. INTERNAL ENGLISH TEST if you don't have an English accredited certificate
2. Academic Interview
Teaching and assessments
Teaching takes place through practical classes, seminars, workshops, discussions, tutorials, rehearsals, theatre and community visits, screenings, and performances. Learning through practice is essential to this course and you will engage in active, experiential and reflective learning throughout.
There is a varied mix of assessment to develop a range of skills including solo and group choreography and performance work, solo and group presentations, teaching practice, class work, viva voces, blogs, portfolios, marketing packs, action plans, and reflective and evaluative essays.
We have one of the largest teams of dance staff in the UK and, as they are practising artists and researchers, you can be assured of keeping up-to-date with current research and trends in dance. Our excellent teaching and research was acknowledged when DMU was designated a Centre for Excellence in the Teaching and Learning of Performance Arts.
Our academic dance staff have international reputations for performance, choreography, research and innovative teaching. World-renowned choreographer and former student, Akram Khan MBE, has acknowledged the “inspirational teaching” he experienced at DMU.
Dance staff work closely with local, national and international dance organisations including Fabric (formerly Dance4) and People Dancing. We also enjoy close links with artists and professional organisations, such as the Akram Khan Company, New Art Club, Moving Together and Serendipity Arts who have offered students work experience and internships.
Contact hours
In your first year you will normally attend around 15 hours of timetabled taught sessions (lectures and tutorials) each week, and we expect you to undertake at least 22 further hours of independent study to complete project work and research.
Career Opportunities
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