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Why Dance Matters

Added on Jul 26, 2012

Two years ago, Nichelle Strzepek, creator of the Dance Advantage dance blog, started the Why Dance Matters movement. Why Dance Matters is a virtual event that rallies the dance community online. By asking everyone to post, share, pin, tweet and talk about why dance matters to you, to your kids, to your students and to your community, the Why Dance Matters movement seeks to affirm the impact dance has on the lives of individuals and communities.

In honor of National Dance Day on Saturday, July 28^th here are some of the comments from the Why Dance Matters Twitter feed and Pinterest page:

“The friends I really trust, who understand me the best and ALWAYS have my back are the ones I grew up dancing with. Those are the kind of friendships that matter.” -18 year old dancer, L.D.
“I don’t worry as much as my friends with teenagers do. I know where my girls are and what they’re doing. They’re at the studio, not out running around looking for ways to occupy their time. The little free time they have is used to do school work and hang out with their dance friends or family. It’s their choice but it definitely makes my life easier! Too much free time very often leads to bad choices at their age.” -mom of 3 dancers, ages 12, 15, 17.
“When we allow our bodies to move & express our emotions, spontaneously, we communicate in our most profound capacity” . LWM
@DanceTherapist says Dance has power to connect, to pierce isolation. To express joy & grief. To encode memory & evoke it.
@LesleaC‏ says Dance matters because it is a universal language understood by all.
‏@healthydancer1 says Dance matters because it expresses emotions in a way that words fail to do.
Dance teaches patience, compassion, understanding, and love.
Dance matters because it fosters growing imaginations.
The truest expression of a people is in its dance and in its music. Bodies never lie. ~Agnes de Mille
Because learning discipline through movement is so much more fun.
Because teaching the little ones life lessons through dance takes time, energy, patience, and love. Because it really counts!
Dance matters because it prepares us for whatever the future holds.

So why does dance matter? Because…

It teaches students to be problem solvers. “If their feet aren’t in the right place, at least their hearts are.” – Christian M. Chensvold
It teaches students to trust their abilities. “Let us first teach little children to breathe, to vibrate, to feel, and to become one with the general harmony and movement of nature. Let us first produce a beautiful human being, a dancing child.” – Isadora Duncan
It teaches them to think outside of the box. “With the pride of the artist, you must blow against the walls of every power that exists in the small trumpet of your defiance.” – Norman Mailer

And Saturday, July 28^th 2012, if you get the choice to sit it out or dance…..