Dance Techniques 2010

Introduction
17
in Cologne), as well as outside guests, were responsible for the writing. At
the Palucca Schule Dresden, this partnership and approach to the work has
resulted in continued cooperation with a dance scholar who has since been
offered teaching assignments.
Rotterdam Dance Academy is currently testing how Countertechnique,
developed by Anouk van Dijk, can be integrated into the standard curriculum:
The existing partnership between the academy and an independent
dance company thus offered a solid basis for carrying out this particular
research project. At LABAN in London, Barbara Passow’s workshop was
integrated into the institution’s annual reconstruction project during which
performances of different styles of modern and postmodern dance are developed
alongside technique classes. Reinhild Hoffmann and the entire research
team used the opportunity to travel to London and investigate the Jooss–
Leeder Technique, thus establishing an historical connection between Barbara
Passow’s training and one of Hoffman’s choreographies.
Procedure and materials
What questions did we want to ask? And more importantly, how did we want
to ask them? Designing a pragmatic, analytical form and observational structure
was a great challenge. Different methods were considered that would
enable us to look specifically at the historical context and, at the same time,
highlight the physical, ideological, as well as the invited experts’ methodical–
didactic approaches. The catalogue of questions 13 that emerged from this discussion
became our navigation system. Each research team had to deal with
eighty-four qualitative research questions, although each question’s relevance
to the respective dance technique varied. Alongside the ongoing dialogue with
consultants and university teams about content and the practical side of the
project, the working structure was determined by theater and dance studies’
observational methods as well as sport and movement analysis methods. 14
The research teams were composed of members from different fields,
which meant that questions were tackled differently. All the teams took a
journey through the ‘eye of the needle’—namely the eighty-four questions—
and this journey served to highlight both the diversity of the techniques as