How Choreographing Prepares You to Be a Social Media Strategist
November 9th, 2010
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Posts Tagged ‘Dance World’
You may have noticed that I have not written here for the past few months. I want to tell you about what I’ve been doing! This semester I am completing a research project on how social and new media technologies are affecting choreography in the dance world.
I have been working the past two months with a group of six dancers to create a 10 minute performance/installation which explores Facebook as a virtual space and method of communication. The piece incorporated projections, live interactions with social networks, and a choreographed flash mob that was organized through Facebook and Youtube. I’ll put some clips from the performance up soon!
Being a dance major with six months left before I enter the real world of graduated folks, I am constantly asked “So are you going to dance professionally next year?” When I say that no, in fact I’m planning on working in social media strategy, I generally receive a look that can be characterized by a mixture of surprise, interest, and pity. “But how?” they exclaim! I could go on for hours on how dancing has prepared me extremely well to do almost anything (maybe not molecular biology), but instead, I’ll leave you with five things I learned in the past few months from choreographing a 10-minute dance.
1. How to organize a flash mob
We’ve all seen the viral videos of choreographed flash mobs on Youtube (Central Station Antwerp, Liverpool, Samsung). When I saw these, my initial reaction was “THAT IS SO COOL.”
After I calmed down a bit, I started to think about how the choreographers could have possibly organized their mobs. Most of these types of flash mobs are backed by large marketing firms with big budgets for some kind of a commercial. However, with the power of social media, anyone with a video camera and a social network can organize a flash mob. In just 4 days, I got 30-40 people to be part of my dance and learn two minutes of simple choreography.
2. How to effectively market a performance using social media
I’ve written about 5 Ways Facebook Can Help Promote Your Event, and this performance let me put those methods into practice. With three nights of performances, over 330 people viewed the dance piece. By collaborating with other dancers in the flash mob, I was able to harness the power of their networks as well as my own.
3. How to manage a group of performers and collaborators to create a final product
Part of social media strategy is creating interactive campaigns in order to reach a specific goal. In a sense, that is exactly what I have been doing these past few months. I worked with a team of six dancers and two visual collaborators to deliver a message to hundreds of viewers. We thought about what was relevant to our audience, put together a final product (or dance) that addressed those ideas, and delivered it to them.
4. How social media can be used to enhance messages
Social media is that thing right now that everyone uses but most people don’t really think about. We take it for granted that we can effectively stalk people we haven’t spoken to in four years or chat with someone online while sitting three feet away from them in real life. Making something viral is about capitalizing on something that no one has noticed or paid much attention to yet everyone knows is true.
To do this, I had discussions with my dancers about some of the things we all do on Facebook that are actually pretty bizarre (unfriending someone?). We then incorporated those things with both live movement and visual projection into the dance.
5. How individuals use Facebook
In order to prepare for this dance, we researched how individuals use Facebook and how Facebook profiles grow. I had each of my dancers start from scratch, create a brand new profile, and spend ten minutes a day on it. We collected information on how they were using the site, who they were interacting with, and what kinds of observations they made. This rich source of information helped us shape the dance so that it was both accessible and engaging to a wide range of audience members. I think the best compliment I received was from one of my professors who only said, “I’m totally going to friend you when I get home.” Awesome.
The message I’m trying to send is to be creative when it comes to your learning. There is no one way to go about your education so be sure to look for opportunities in places you wouldn’t expect. For me, that place was choreographing a dance piece.
Photo credit: All photos by Teague Hopkins.
November 9, 2010 | Filed Under Post, Uncategorized | 3 Comments
I went to a seminar last week where Seth Godin talked about how to become a linchpin. He talked about the things he usually talks about: being irreplaceable, spreading messages that are worth spreading, being willing to fail, etc.
Photo Credit: Wa-J on Flickr
It was an extremely engaging talk and got me to thinking about how the dance world could really benefit from his advice.
Dance is going through a very interesting and somewhat frightening revolution. We are seeing a new culture emerge that embraces “the hired body,” the dancer that masters a set of techniques dictated by a specific dance vocabulary, almost like a checklist.
That’s a lot of jargony language, but basically what I’m saying is that today, dancers are being trained so that they can be hired. They are being trained so that no matter what kind of movement a choreographer gives them, they will be able to do it.
The problem with this is that instead of becoming artists, instead of becoming linchpins, and instead of becoming irreplaceable, these dancers become cogs. At the very best, they become exceptional at being told what to do.
Photo Credit: PhillyLambs on Flickr
We see this on shows like So You Think You Can Dance all the time. They accept exceptionally trained dancers that can convincingly perform any style of dance that is thrown at them. And they are all very good at being told what to do.
So what’s wrong with being told what to do? A lot! It creates the impression that the only way to be successful as a dancer is to be a hirable body, when in reality if that is all you can do, you’ll be replaced by some 18-year-old by the time you are 27.
You shouldn’t be able to write down art. Art is about self-expression but it seems that the emphasis in mainstream dance is trending towards perfection and mastery. It makes people describe the dance world as “cutthroat” instead of supportive and innovative.
I’m not arguing that technique isn’t necessary. I’m arguing that having good technique shouldn’t be measured by someone being able to execute a checklist of movements.
Singers and musicians aren’t respected just because they can hit high notes; they are respected because they put their heart and soul into their work to create true art. Dancers should be judged no differently.
Photo by Yannick Bindert
So what do we do? We give dancers the tools to be successful while being different. We create a community that allows people to fail in order to promote innovation. I think we can learn a lot from the avant-garde fashion industry, which praises and respects designers and artists that take a chance, even if they (or their models) fall on their face.
We need to show dancers that you can still make beautiful art without pointing your toes all the time or being able to do a triple pirouette into a front flip suicide.
Let’s make real artists and not just hired bodies.
July 27, 2010 | Filed Under Post, Uncategorized | 1 Comment