Valuing Dance

Valuing Dance maintains this duality of dance -- between gift function and commodity exchange -- by showing that most dance forms flicker between commodity and gift and are not wholly subsumed by one value system. ... In advocating for dance-as-gift, Valuing Dance is not being nostalgic or Pollyannaish; rather, it strives to identify and preserve the dynamism of dance. To do so is urgent, Foster argues, because it's only as gift that dance "function[s] to stabilize a society and to affirm continuity and strength in the face of loss, impermanence, and change." * Heather Houser, Public Books *
What is dance, or dancing, worth? In magisterial analyses, Foster explores how dance operates as labor and the unlikely, but inevitable, material of global capital and exchange. In Valuing Dance, we learn of the exquisite and complex action of sharing gesture, of creating gift through our very movements, and of the diverse and divergent ways dancers pass physically through systems of belief. Foster takes on the challenging questions of gestural equivalencies with capacious determination and unfailing insight. For anyone who has ever wondered, 'Why Dance?' * Thomas F. DeFrantz, Duke University and Director, SLIPPAGE:Performance *
'Actions create value,' Susan Leigh Foster argues in her bold and brilliant Valuing Dance. But what kind of value, labor, and systems of exchange give dance its value? As she moves us through the economies of gift and commodity exchange, Foster advocates for choreographies that offer more just and sustainable futures. This work is a necessary intervention for scholars across a broad range of disciplines. * Diana Taylor, University Professor, New York University *