News

"The Devil Ties My Tongue" SKETCH Series 2013 | photo: David DeSilva

DDP will cover stories from the corporate, for profit world regarding issues surrounding pay equity and transparency where relevant, such as other industries with low representation of women: tech, the sciences, venture capital, the entertainment industry, etc. to examine parallels between these male dominated spheres where informal hiring and word of mouth is the norm.

New York Times: In Her Words: For Three Suffragists, a Monument Well Past Due

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By Alisha Haridasani Gupta

6 August 2020

Across the country, monuments honoring racist figures are being defaced and toppled. In New York’s Central Park, one statue is taking shape that aims to amend not only racial but also gender disparities in public art: A 14-foot-tall bronze monument of Susan B. Anthony, Sojourner Truth and Elizabeth Cady Stanton, three of the more prominent leaders in the nationwide fight for women’s right to vote

Called the Women’s Rights Pioneers Monument, it is to be unveiled Aug. 26 to commemorate the 100th anniversary this month of the constitutional amendment that finally guaranteed women that right, depicts the three figures gathered around a table for what seems to be a discussion or a strategy meeting. Anthony stands in the middle, holding a pamphlet that reads “Votes for Women”; Stanton, seated to her left, holds a pen, presumably taking notes; and Truth appears to be in midsentence.

“I wanted to show women working together,” said Meredith Bergmann, the sculptor chosen from dozens of artists to create the statue. “I kept thinking of women now, working together in some kitchen on a laptop, trying to change the world.”

Read the full article here.

Dance Magazine: Op-Ed: Where is Your Outrage? Where is Your Support?

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By Theresa Ruth Howard

01 June 2020

For the last five years the dance world, and specifically the ballet world, has been enrolled in the mission to understand and implement diversity, equity and inclusion into the field at all levels. A great deal of funding has been allocated towards efforts of education and training, consultants have been hired, conferences and seminars attended.

I myself am a part of a three-year initiative, The Equity Project, which is a learning cohort of 21 ballet companies to increase the presence of Blacks in ballet. And in many ways there has been progress made. With raised awareness, core values and mission statements have been amended to reflect these aspirations; recruitment has made pipelines browner; there are more brown dancers on stages. We are not there yet, but certainly there has been progress.

And then something like the global pandemic of COVID-19 comes along and in an instant distills all of it down to a few simple choices and actions or lack thereof. What COVID has wrought upon the dance world in many ways is irreparable. The rolling effect of lockdowns resulted in unrecoverable loss of revenue for dance organizations that will undoubtedly change the landscape forever. But few could predict that this global health crisis would create the unprecedented opportunity for dance organizations who profess to be authentically committed to the work of DEI to have the veracity of their progress tested. Unfortunately right now to the Black dance community, they are failing.

Read the full article here.

New York Times: She’s Been a Force for Change in Ballet. The World Is Catching Up.

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By Siobhan Burke

6 August 2020

On May 29, four days after George Floyd was killed by the Minneapolis police, Theresa Ruth Howard posted a call to action on Instagram:

“Demonstrate your outrage

Demonstrate your allyship

Demonstrate your authenticity

We don’t need shadow heroes, step into the light …”

Ms. Howard, a former ballet dancer who founded the digital platform Memoirs of Blacks in Ballet (or MoBBallet), was addressing the institutions she has worked with for the past few years, in a role she sums up as “diversity strategist and consultant.” Those institutions, which include some of the world’s most prestigious ballet companies and schools, are predominantly white, onstage and behind the scenes. They know they need to evolve, and she is helping them.

So when protests against systemic racism and police brutality began sweeping the country, she found their silence disconcerting. “You can’t say you want us, and when we are in peril, not be there for us,” Ms. Howard, 49, said in an interview.

Over the next few days, companies answered her call, or tried, posting statements of support with a hashtag she had started: #balletrelevesforblacklives. (Relevé, a ballet term, is a way of saying “rise up.”) Their messages drew both appreciation and criticism, with many commenters demanding action, not merely words. In an opinion piece for Dance Magazine, Ms. Howard expanded on her thoughts about what leadership should look like in this moment, under the headline “Where Is Your Outrage? Where Is Your Support?”

On Aug. 14, leaders from more than a dozen ballet companies and schools will convene for an online discussion titled “#balletrelevesforblacklives … Or Does It?,” a chance to reflect, beyond social media, on the Black Lives Matter movement and its impact on their institutions. The public event is part of Ms. Howard’s second annual MoBBallet symposium, a series of conversations and lectures that, in her words, “centers Blackness but welcomes all.”

Read the full article in the New York Times.

Charlotte Ballet: #WOMENINCHOREO Wednesday with Stephanie Martinez

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17 June 2020

Since Artistic Director Hope Muir took the helm of Charlotte Ballet in 2018 the company has commissioned work into the repertoire from female choreographers each season. Women have long been underrepresented in creative roles with professional dance companies, but thanks to Muir Charlotte Ballet has a renewed commitment to providing opportunities to these intelligent and inspiring choreographers. We are excited about this new social mini-series #WomeninChoreo Wednesday where you will get to hear advice directly from those women, as well as gather insight as to how they are fueling their creative outlets during their time at home.⁠

OUR CHAT WITH STEPHANIE MARTINEZ

1. With theaters closed and schedules disrupted through the crisis of Covid 19, how are you engaging with your art and staying both active and creative?

I’ve been taking class at home, it’s been fun to join classes that I wouldn’t normally be able to attend. I’ve also been reading “True and False” by David Mamet which covers different acting techniques. I’m trying to dig into different art forms and expand my thinking beyond the realm of dance so that I can bring a richer perspective to my work once we’re back in the studio.

2. Every creative process is unique in its own way, can you describe your experience working with Charlotte Ballet and how it may have differed from other companies?

When I create a ballet, especially for the work at Charlotte Ballet, it’s crucial for me to conceptualize and build an environment first. The reality is that an empty space can be a bit paralyzing, so I like to give very clear, specific tasks to the room so that we’re all working collectively towards creating something that feels honest, alive, and satisfying. The dancers at Charlotte Ballet are extremely passionate and have a fascination for exploration that continuously improves their skill level. I’ll be honest, Charlotte Ballet is one of my favorite companies that I’ve had the honor of working with to date. The dancers are open and curious, demanding a lot of themselves and producing an environment that any choreographer would love to work in. I could see the dancers growing day-to-day, trusting their instincts, making new choices, and building characters that were truthful and compelling. It is not a cookie-cutter company, but each individual in the room worked toward a united standard of excellence set by Hope’s leadership.

Read the full Q&A here.

The Guardian: The ‘shecession’: why economic crisis is affecting women more than men

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By Amanda Holpuch

4 August 2020

Denise Frederick hasn’t stopped working since the pandemic began. But the nanny and home carer in New York City has also seen her pay cut in both jobs and she is uncertain about how long she will have either with the coronavirus outbreak far from under control.

Like many women, the economic fallout from the coronavirus pandemic has hit Frederick hard. For the first time in history, the US is in a “shecession” – an economic downturn where job and income losses are affecting women more than men.

The family Frederick worked for left the city in the early days of the outbreak, but continued to pay her normally until last month when they cut her pay to hire a nanny where they are staying. They don’t know if they will return to the city before her contract expires at the end of the year.

Meanwhile, Frederick’s pay was cut at her home carer job, which she has commuted to on the bus and subway since the pandemic began and where she has to pay for her own personal protective equipment (PPE).

Frederick, a single mother, moved from St Lucia four years ago to fulfill a life goal: to put her 19-year-old daughter through college. “I keep saying to her, focus on school, let me figure out where the next meal is going to come from, let me figure out how the bills are going to get paid, because I don’t want her to get stressed out about me and then it’s affecting her grades,” Frederick said.

In the Great Recession, men lost twice as many jobs as women. But from February to May, 11.5 million women lost their jobs compared with 9 million men because of business closures intended to stop the spread of Covid-19. By the end of April, women’s job losses had erased a decade of employment gains.

The staggering figures have underlined the changing nature of the workforce and brought into focus the overlooked issues attached to that shift. Women, especially women of color, are more vulnerable to sudden losses of income because of the gender pay gap and are more dependent on childcare and school to be able to work.

Read the full article here.

New York Times: In Her Words: Finish the Fight!

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By Veronica Chambers, Jennifer Schuessler, Amisha Padnani, Jennifer Harlan, Sandra E. Garcia and Vivian Wang

28 July 2020

It took the better part of a century to pass a law saying American women had the right to vote. Three generations of women, and their male allies, worked tirelessly to make the 19th Amendment — which decreed that states could not discriminate at the polls on the basis of sex — a reality. We call the right to vote “suffrage,” but for a long time, that word was a kind of shorthand for women’s rights. Without the vote, suffragists argued, women had little say over their lives and their futures and certainly much less when it came to the larger political questions that shaped the nation.

The 19th Amendment is a cornerstone of gender equality in our country, yet many of us know very little about the way the right to vote was won. For a long time, the history of the suffrage movement has been told mainly as the story of a few famous white women, like Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony. It’s true they were among the most important leaders of the movement in the 19th century.

The 19th Amendment is a cornerstone of gender equality in our country, yet many of us know very little about the way the right to vote was won. For a long time, the history of the suffrage movement has been told mainly as the story of a few famous white women, like Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony. It’s true they were among the most important leaders of the movement in the 19th century.

Mary Church Terrell and the Power of Language

Sometimes freedom is a matter of timing. Mary Church Terrell knew that lesson well. She was born in Memphis in September 1863 — the middle of the Civil War. Her parents had been enslaved, but Mary was born free, and she charted a course of leadership that helped change the lives of women and men across the nation. She became a suffragist. She fought for the rights of all people of color. Holding America to the promises of the Declaration of Independence — life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness for all — became her life’s work.

These dreams were supported by her parents. Her father, Robert Church, was the son of an enslaved woman and a wealthy steamship owner who had allowed Robert to keep his wages. After Robert gained his freedom, he invested in real estate and became wealthy.

Read the full article online here.

2019-2020 Season Overview Release

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Dance Data Project® (DDP) today releases its 2019-2020 Season Overview, a statistical examination of choreographer gender within the seasons of the Top 50 U.S. companies. This year’s report indicates a significant increase in programming equity from last year, but men remain favored in almost every category.

Read more

The Lily: We talked to an employment lawyer about ‘mom bias.’ Here’s what she wants you to know.

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Stephanie Murray

27 July 2020

In late May, a working mom named Dris Wallace filed a complaint to the human resources office at her company. Her manager had been insisting that she keep her toddlers quiet during work calls while working from home during the coronavirus, which she felt was an impossible and discriminatory standard.

A week later, she was fired.

That’s when employment attorney Daphne Delvaux stepped in and filed a lawsuit against Wallace’s company on her behalf.

For Delvaux, who specializes in defending mothers facing discrimination at work — or retaliation for reporting it — this is just another day on the job. According to her, “mom bias” has always been a problem in the corporate world, but the coronavirus has exacerbated it. Businesses are under pressure to cut costs, and workers are terrified of losing work, creating fertile ground for abuse. Since many businesses are reopening while so many day cares and schools remain closed, it will probably get worse before it gets better.

In addition to her work as a litigator, Delvaux runs The Mama Attorney, an organization devoted to educating mothers about their rights at work so that they can protect both their time with their kids and their careers as they transition to motherhood.

Here are a few things she wants working moms to know:

‘Mom bias’ is real and no industry is immune to it

Bias against parents — and specifically mothers — arises out of a workplace culture that favors unencumbered workers, Delvaux said. “Employers like people at work who are a hundred percent committed, so they don’t have any other obligations, no health concerns, they don’t have to take a leave of absence, they don’t have to take breaks, they don’t have to ask for accommodation — the employers favor those employees.” As a result, managers operating under pressure to hit quotas are often really hard on employees with obvious limitations or outside obligations.

With mothers in particular, Delvaux has observed a pervasive perception that they are “less available,” and “too distracted” to do their jobs properly. As a result, a lot of mothers face discrimination either before or after maternity leave, based on the assumption that they will be less committed to their jobs. Some of the mothers Delvaux has represented came back from maternity leave only to be immediately replaced, or let go while their employer continued to post new job openings. Others were muscled out, demoted or forced to cut their maternity leaves short.

Read the full article online here.

The Observer: Troy Powell, Artistic Director of Ailey II, Has Been Fired for Sexual Misconduct

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By 

20 July 2020

Troy Powell has been removed from his position as Artistic Director of Ailey II following an independent investigation into alleged acts of sexual misconduct. This investigation was launched in early June after two videos accusing Powell of inappropriate behavior were posted on TikTok, the popular video sharing app.

The first video involved dancers dropping scraps of paper as a message appeared: “When you wanna be in Ailey II. But guys gotta sleep with Troy Powell.” The second video involved an unidentified dancer accusing the Ailey organization of housing a known sexual predator. After these videos were removed from TikTok, the Ailey organization placed Powell on leave of absence. His name and most-recently choreographed ballet were also stricken from Ailey’s June 11th Virtual Spirit Gala. The gala was an online substitute for the company’s traditional spring gala event, which Powell choreographed last year using students from the Ailey School.

Online outrage to the allegations included denouncements from Ryan Houston, a former apprentice with Ailey II—who urged dancers via an Instagram post to speak up about their experiences with Powell—and from Addison Ector, a former student of the Ailey School and soloist with Complexions Ballet.

In an Instagram video that was posted on June 29, Ector alleged that during his time as a student at the Ailey School, Powell sent him a text message containing an inappropriate photo of his anatomy. In Ector’s recollection, he was interrogated about the incident by a male director of the Ailey School. After being asked if Powell’s face was in the picture—it was not—Ector stated that he was told, “Well we can’t really confirm that it was him or not.” A Title XI investigation was not launched on Ector’s behalf. Instead, he continued to interact with Powell during the remainder of his time as a student.

Read the full article here.

FSU | Corps de Ballet International: Current Perspectives in Ballet and the Arts: Examining the Relevancy, Recovery and Resilience

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Florida State University has shared a recording from the Current Perspectives in Ballet and the Arts: Examining the Relevancy, Recovery and Resilience panel from Corps de Ballet International‘s conference. The panel included the following leaders from the industry:

Melanie Person, Panel Facilitator; Co-Director, The Ailey School
Robert Garland, Resident Choreographer, Dance Theatre of Harlem
Stefanie Batten Bland, Choreographer, Ballet Arts and Jerome Robbins fellow
Ashley Bouder, Principal Dancer, New York City Ballet
Elena Comendador, Costume Designer & Ballet Faculty, Marymount Manhattan College
James Gilmer, Dancer, Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater
Iyun Ashani Harrison, Creative Director, Ballet Ashani

Watch the panel at the link below:

https://fsu.zoom.us/rec/play/tcJ-cO_6r2k3EtSS4gSDC6UrW466f6-s0idMqfVYyBq0ASYHZAaiZudANuPo61Eam6XNGpd10N2x1g4H?continueMode=true&_x_zm_rtaid=j3y_uDfjRiKMamXz68JBxA.1595259270504.654acd099229083ccc09c3882e9bc26b&_x_zm_rhtaid=940