The Truth and Nothing but the Truth

 

                                             Photo: Brett Jordan via Unsplash.com

In my previous blog I discussed the concept of acquiescence in interviews, and so I wanted to continue to research how the oppressive side of dance culture can manifest itself in other research methods, such as surveys.

 

I’ve been thinking a lot about the ethical aspect of surveys in relation to my inquiry topic. Given the taboo discussing money within the industry (and in British society in general) I was wondering whether more dancers may feel more comfortable completing a survey as opposed to  partaking in an interview. I still am keen to interview dancers since I feel this will give me a greater understanding of and provide context for any opinions and points of views expressed. However, I am slightly fearful that I will have difficulty finding dancers willing to talk to me about the topic, especially those to whom I am a stranger. 

 

In terms of surveys, it is also important to consider that dancers are extremely self-aware and fearful of judgement. This stems in my opinion from professional training, where dancers are encouraged to seek out flaws with the aid of mirrors, and then later on from professional dance culture, where dancers have to constantly self-correct in class often without input from teachers and choreographers. Naturally these two activities require a great deal of reflexivity and self-awareness, however there is the danger that in the context of surveys dancers may in fact think too much about how their answers will be perceived, and thus self-censor, rendering the data acquired unreliable. 

 

I recently read a very interesting article that discussed a study done on professional contemporary dancers in Australia, an aspect of which required the dancers to fill in forms detailing how they were feeling physically and mentally throughout the choreographic process. The forms were then given back to the choreographer so that she could ascertain the general mood of the dancers and therefore could plan the following rehearsals accordingly. This well-intentioned strategy did not work out as well as envisaged, partly because the dancers demonstrated the effects of certain aspects of dance culture by not always answering the surveys truthfully, as explained below,

“The dancers however reported feeling that there ‘was a certain level of judgement’ (Dancer 3 Focus Group 20th September 2017) associated with the monitoring and had hesitations about being completely ‘honest with them’ (Dancer 3 Focus Group 20th September 2017)” – Hopper, Blevins, Erskine et al, pg 480

The article then went on to show how in the dancers’ eyes a negative judgement of them by a choreographer could not only impact their current ‘status’, but also hinder already rare future opportunities in a very competitive industry,

“The dancers therefore highlighted concerns in expressing to Hill their true physical and mental state at the risk of missing opportunities in the performance particularly when future opportunities to perform are often unknown or involve a large lapse of time in between contracts.” – Hopper, Blevins, Erskine et al, pg 481

 

Naturally, my situation as a researcher is different from that of choreographer, and since the surveys will be anonymous, I will have no way of identifying any dancers that take part. I do feel though that the concepts of fear of judgement and hyper self-awareness are important ethical considerations within this method of research, and I myself need to be aware of these as a survey creator and interviewer in order to make my research as ethical and reliable as possible. 

 

Article Discussed: 

Luke S. Hopper , Peta Blevins , Shona Erskine , Danica Hendry , Raewyn Hill & Richard Longbottom (2020) Sustaining dancer wellbeing through independent professional dance careers, Theatre, Dance and Performance Training, 11:4, 470-486, DOI: 10.1080/19443927.2020.1740312