Prosthetics in Performance: Exploring the Relationship Between Ballet Dancers and Their Pointe Shoes
Date Thesis Awarded
5-2017
Access Type
Honors Thesis -- Access Restricted On-Campus Only
Degree Name
Bachelors of Arts (BA)
Department
Anthropology
Advisor
Brad Weiss
Committee Members
Jonathan Glasser
Leslie Cochrane
Abstract
Getting her first pair of pointe shoes is an important milestone for a young ballet dancer. From then on, throughout her ballet “career” (whether she becomes a professional or not), her pointe shoes will play an important role in shaping her dancing and her physical form. Ballet’s strict aesthetic requirements demand visually long body lines. Pointe shoes are uniquely able to meet those demands by augmenting and extending a dancer’s physical body. Through choosing, personalizing, training with, and eventually “killing” pointe shoes, dancers incorporate the footwear as prosthetic extensions of their own bodies and intentions. As a result, prosthetic pointe shoes play an integral role in the performative and objectifying realities of ballet dance.
Recommended Citation
Dassler, Georgia E., "Prosthetics in Performance: Exploring the Relationship Between Ballet Dancers and Their Pointe Shoes" (2017). Undergraduate Honors Theses. William & Mary. Paper 1132.
https://scholarworks.wm.edu/honorstheses/1132
