Thick Like Me. . .
Thick Like Me. . .
Thick Like Me...
Thick Like Me is an ongoing exhibition of performance, artistic expression, research, and film featuring full-size Black women dancers. By uplifting the creative work of these women, we begin dismantling the stigmas of fatphobia in dance and support intersectional justice in the dance community. We share how to acknowledge, celebrate, prepare, and mentor thick dancers. We problematize the assumed connection between health and body size to advocate for dancers’ holistic well-being. We encourage consistent discussion and reflection to resist the perpetual oppression of thick Black women in dance and beyond.
What We Do...
Thick Like Me is about Body Liberation for all, focusing on the intersection of fat Black Women in Dance. We reimagine what types of artists and kinds of bodies are celebrated in fine art spaces. Centering fat Black women through the creative process, exhibitions, performances, and talk-backs invert hierarchal systems of oppression. When thick Black women take center stage, systemic injustices of patriarchy, racism, and fatphobia are resisted and dismantled in favor of justice and liberation.
We excavate the underlying theories and histories that have resulted in the subjugation of fat black women in dance. We firmly root ourselves in praxis that engages with theories, including Standpoint Theory, Critical Race Theory, Black Feminist Theory, Body Liberation, and Black Performance Theory. Additionally, we highlight counternarratives by uplifting current practitioners who support the liberation of their own bodies and everyone else's. We deploy interactive education and learning strategies that center positionality, critical self-reflection, community collaboration, and liberation that stem from collective justice and power redistribution.
Services
- Movement Workshops
- Repertory Work
- Commissioned Choreography
- Dramaturgy
- Consulting
- Exhibitions
Past Work
This research has been presented at:
- The International Association of Blacks in Dance (2020)
- The Center for Black, Brown, and Queer Studies Conference (2023)
- Urban Arts Space (2023)
- The Collegium of African Diaspora Dance (2022 & 2024)
Video
Thick Like Me . . .
Collaborators
Jazelynn Goudy
Marymount Manhattan College
Davianna Griffin
Slippery Rock University of Pennsylvania
Dr. Alex Christmas
The Ohio State University
Jazelynn Goudy
A gravity-defying performing artist scholar and Elliot Norton Award-winning choreographer whose Black girl movement vocabulary is an array of life experiences. She is an Assistant Professor at Marymount Manhattan College, Steering Committee member of Coalition of Diasporan Scholars Moving, and Embodied (Hip Hop) Scholars Crew Founder, guest artist for SLMDances.
Davianna Griffin
A Black queer woman artist, performer, and curator of spaces that amplify the voices and lineages of the Black existence. Her work probes the stories and nuances of Black girl and womanhood. Davianna works as a visiting dance faculty at Slippery Rock University of Pennsylvania
Dr. Alesondra (Alex) Christmas Stapleton
Dr. Christmas is a lecturer in the Department of Dance at The Ohio State University, whose dissertation research focused on Racial Battle Fatigue in Black women dance educators. Her work uplifts Black women in dance through valuing their thought, labor, and creative practices within the academy and beyond.
