El trabajo del entrenador/a como profesor/a

This theme relates to the style of dance practice (balletic dance forms), and to gender (that is, it primarily addressed the appearance of female dancers). The concern with slimness mentioned by participants is consonant with the arguments of social constructionist theorists such as Featherstone (1991) and

Gullette (1998) in relation to self-monitoring and weight control. Putting on weight was seen as equivalent to letting go of the discipline and control endemic to dancers’ habitus, which supports Turner and Wainwright’s (2002) Bourdieusian framework, while connecting it more specifically with gender. In so doing I suggest that developing the notion of sexual capital in relation to gendered ageing is useful in understanding the gendered basis of bodily conformity to codes governing physical appearance and instrumentality. Finally, generational shifts in gender codes in dance were noted by participants, which lends support to Sullivan’s (2000) and Butler’s (1993) positions that cultural codes can be subverted gradually through minor deviations from their ‘correct’ reiteration.

Statements from participants often referred to a felt discrepancy between the dancer’s body type and the ideal type valued in their dance practice. Some forms of dance require higher levels of bodily conformity than others. Classical ballet, for example, is a highly codified system with specific prescriptions for the type of body and its physical range or articulation (such as the much valued 180 degree turnout of the legs). Other, less ‘closed’ dance practices are more flexible in this respect; in some, body type is considered irrelevant.

A comment from one of the men interviewed directly addresses the difference between classical ballet and contemporary dance as one of ‘textbook’ control versus a relative laxity of precision that is more ‘forgiving’ on the older dancer’s body. In a highly coded movement system such as ballet, progressive wear and tear occasioned over repetitions of the same movements ‘naturally’ limit the lifespan of the dancer’s career, analogous to repetition strain injuries:

George (37, director, teacher, choreographer): “I respect the classical

technique so much now, because you can get away with a lot more in a contemporary style. You can … let the body go and explode more through energy, in a position that not necessarily has a textbook … idea to it. So you can basically make something up as you go, and it’s still movement ...

whereas your energy and strength in classical comes from being able to control the technique. So you can probably be a little bit more out of control with your contemporary work. And so therefore as you get older … although it’s still very strenuous, it can be a little bit more forgiving on the body, because you don’t actually have to land and lock into those positions; you can allow yourself to be a bit more forgiving in placement.”

Physical aptitude plays a major role in both classical and ballet-derived contemporary dance forms; the difference is that its evidence in the dancer’s performance is more immediately evident in classical ballet, which is based on a visual, external and therefore highly specific code of movement that makes little allowance for the material specificity of the dancer’s body. However, in both forms ageing results in a perceived, age-related ‘decline’ and the ultimate cessation of performing and practice.

3.3.7.1 Gendered conformity to dance codes

Participants frequently commented on the pressures of bodily conformity in dance, particularly in classical ballet. These comments generally reflected the dancers’ experience of not fitting particular stereotypes of body shape and presentation. This was particularly so for women, as Meredith’s comment illustrates:

Meredith (31, dancer): “In my younger days, it was really important for me to

look like a dancer ... because it was very focused on my image attitude, and, of course I enjoyed what I did, but then that became so destructive through an eating disorder ... I think a lot of dancers spend their lives—as I did—looking in the mirror for hours every day, and this festered an unhealthy relationship between me and that image, as I was never satisfied with what I saw.”

The irony is that the ‘perfect body’ in classical dance is an unattainable ideal, therefore the female dancer never feels ‘good enough’. Her body becomes coded as ‘lacking’ in falling short of this unattainable ideal, toward which she

constantly strives, in intense competition against other female dancers. Alana recalls finding herself disillusioned and dropping out of ballet school in her youth by the ethos of what Dempster (cited in Summers-Bremner, 2000) has called a ‘conditioning to fail’:

Alana (43, choreographer, experimental dance performer): “[The ballet

school] was awful. I felt so insecure, there were so many anorexics around, throwing up in the toilets and ... it was foul. You get caught up in the mentality of never being good enough; it’s taken years to get over that.”

Conforming to the normative body code for a female dancer is a body project requiring ongoing self-monitoring and weight control to maintain the desired physique. Significantly, only one of the male participants referred to the issue of weight in performing, and his example is a female dancer:

Martin (41, dancer): “I wouldn’t pay money to go and see a person who’s like

fat and frumpy and trying to do a classical ballet, and she’s fat and frumpy and rolls are hanging off her. No matter how old she is, I don’t care if she’s 20 or 30 or 40, I wouldn’t do it.”

In classically derived dance forms the ideal appearance of the female dancer’s body is prized so highly that individuals will undergo significant body modification to attain it as an entry ticket to employment. Meredith recalls a case of a dancer who opted for plastic surgery in order to be accepted by a prestigious ballet company:

“When [a friend of mine] was studying at the [dance college], one of the people that went through the same year as she did, who was a very, very good classical dancer, was offered a position with the [dance company], but her boobs were too big. She had everything else, she had the right physique, but she had large breasts, and they actually suggested that she get a boob job, and she did, and they employed her ... she reduced the size of her breasts and got a job with a professional ballet company.”

Her own response to the bodily conformity associated with the gender stereotypes in ballet was one of refusal from an early age:

“I never had the ballet dream even as a child, ballet was too girlie for me ... But I didn’t have the hope that ... ballerina ... dainty, precious ... petite, protected, princess sort of role. (Objectified...) Oh, totally, yeah, and very gender specific. When I was younger I couldn’t give you those reasons, I didn’t know what the reasons were, I just knew I didn’t like it.”

Another female participant was unable to aim for a career with a prestigious national ballet company because of lack of height rather than lack of ability. A former pupil of the company’s school, her adult height was predicted by the school at age 13, which determined whether or not she would have a future performing career with the company:

Brittany (46, dance teacher): “I actually started at nine, and stayed [at the

School] until I was 13. They take wrist x-rays, so they know how tall you’re going to be ... and they judge very accurately in most cases. So they knew I was going to be too small for the company. So when I hit 13 they said that I could stay on and train to be a teacher, or move on somewhere else.”

Height requirement in partnering work is an issue for women, not men, because of the shortness (and shortage) of men dancing. Most female dancers remain in the corps de ballet (the rank-and-file) for a significant part of their dancing careers, therefore uniformity of height is important, as Brittany’s comment indicates:

(So the height requirement … I’ve heard somewhere it’s to do with when your partner is…) “Well, actually with the [Company] it was with the corps de ballet, because when I was younger they had the best corps de ballet, they were all the same height. Partner … if you’re really brilliant, you’ll be found a partner, and it’s better for a female to be small than too tall, because not very many tall men do dance, unfortunately. So there were some very brilliant

small boys, men, but they had a lot of problems having parts, or parts had to be specially made for them, because girls when they are on pointe are another up to 10 centimeters in height.”

Significantly, it is women’s bodies that are evaluated on physical attributes such as height and weight (the short men had “parts specially made for them”, but not the women who didn’t fit the height requirement). This is partly due to the greater ratio of women to men ballet dancers. From Brittany’s comments on her daughter’s difficulty in joining a dance company in Australia, this applies across several generations:

“She’s very tiny, like myself; I sent her to France to the Conservatoire in Lyon, and she really enjoyed that. But then she decided she didn’t want to go and dance overseas, which is probably her only option. She wanted to be a classical dancer, so she just gave up, when she was 18. But it is hard when you’re small. It’s a lot of hard work; you have to dance better ... It’s, you know, soul-destroying sometimes ... Physique is very important.”

In the following comment, another interviewee provides a good example of how deviations from the ‘accepted’ standards for the dancer’s body can provide an opportunity for humiliation within the dance industry:

Margaret (49, high school teacher): “And the thing that stops me going [to a

gala function] is, ‘Oh God, I’ve put on too much weight’ … I think, what sort of mentality is this? And my son said, ‘Mum, just go!’ And I said, ‘yeah, but I know exactly what’s going to be said, and even what’s not said’. This sort of implied meaning that comes through various body languages and things like that. You know exactly what they’re saying up here, it’s not coming out there [points to mouth]. You know. And it’s like: ‘Darling! You look so well!’ [laugh] And you think, ‘bitch!’ [laugh] And you think, well at least I don’t have a hip replacement.”

Another participant referred to the pressures of bodily conformity in ballet, but saw them as historically variable. She comments on the change in body type (from waiflike to a more muscular shape) in the new millennium’s professional ballet dancers:

Pia (60, dance lecturer): “I think it’s gone away from that anorexic look a bit, that you’re getting a little bit more back to the ... earlier days, when there seemed to be a bit more flesh and people were quite happy with that. I think it’s nice to see ... bodies that are ... not skinny, they’re covered, and they’re worked bodies ... they have some boobs and things.”

Indeed, according to another, it is not merely body shape that is changing but also contemporary codes of dance performance, permitting the emergence of challenges to bodily conformity, especially for women:

Nicholas (63, dancer): “The women are coming in the ballets now more strong

almost than the men, I find. On stage, men and women are equal. Sometimes the women are more strong ... I mean mainly in contemporary dance, because in classical dance the girl will be always a princess of beauty, a Cinderella, and the man will be the prince. But in contemporary dance, the woman gets very close to the man, and you see in a lot of ballets that a lot of women are lifting the man. And they are strong, the personality is equal now. In life it’s also like that.”

Whereas in the above comments the emphasis placed on the appearance of the body is significant for women, for men it is more the act of dancing that is important. Some female participants referred to masculine stereotypes impacting upon opportunities for men to dance. One perceived this as working to the advantage of boys in that, because of the stigma attached to boys dancing, those who do decide to dance have greater opportunities for performance than girls:

Sinead (27, Irish dance teacher): “It’s harder to get a boy into class ... because

put it? A girl will go dancing quicker than a boy does. It is a great thing for a boy to know how to dance because it’s great opportunities, more so for boys, because there’s not many of them that do it, so ... they’ll have a better chance of getting into these big shows because ... they need a boy. In theatre dancing also you need a boy.”

Another participant’s comment refers to the stigma for a man in a heterosexist culture to become a ballet dancer, a phenomenon which she sees as historically variable:

Lynette (68, yoga teacher): “It was much more difficult in those days for men

to be a part of the ballet company. And generally in those days again most of the guys were gay, which is fine, but I think now that’s changing a bit, and that’s good, and I think more guys are interested in dancing now. It doesn’t have the stigma attached to it that it had then.”

In summary, the above comments all in some way refer to the degree to which different practices of dance are coded in ways that include or exclude bodies from participating in them. In styles such as ballet and mainstream contemporary dance, the strictures placed on the appearance of the body require women dancers to conform to an ‘ideal body’, strictures that are mediated through reliance on external cues (mirrors, scales) and discourse. There is some indication in interviewees’ comments that this and other forms of coding the dancer’s body have changed from the previous generation (more muscular bodies; women performing moves previously considered only for men). However, other dance practices that are not as heavily coded and, significantly, not as culturally valorized, offer more opportunities for dancers to express individual qualities. Here dancers rely on internal cues to their progress, and appear less concerned with bodily conformity to normative ideals.