Angela Pickard becomes first Professor of Dance Education in UK

Professor Pickard’s appointment in 2021 makes her the highest-ranking member in her field, progressing from Reader to Professor. The award recognises the work of talented professionals, practitioners and academics, who have made an impact on the UK’s dance sector.

Professor Pickard’s work was externally nominated, shortlisted and then judged by a panel of experts. The award recognises an individual who has engaged in research, informed by the needs and questions raised by those working in dance.

“I am thrilled and honoured to become the first Professor of Dance Education in the UK. This is important recognition of the impact of my work in the field and beyond and is excellent for the sector too.”

Angela has successfully led academic, institutional and strategic developments in the UK and internationally, and has played a key role in developing and innovating in the fields of Dance Education and Dance Science. 

Professor Pickard’s research, ‘Ballet Body Narratives’, is an on-going examination of embodiment and the construction of ballet bodies with adolescence ballet dancers in elite ballet schools in England. She has disseminated this work nationally and internationally as conferences papers, seminars and workshops. She has also presented and published in relation to the on-going study, aspects related to talent development, gender, motivation, embodied identity, ballet culture, pain, pleasure and perfectionism in ballet, from sociological and philosophical perspectives.

Part of her ballet research offers greater insights into why there is a ‘taken for granted’ and a normalisation of pain in ballet training, that there is pleasure in the pursuit of perfectionism as motivation and that there are sociological, psychological and pedagogical implications in the development of adolescent dancer, as they engage in the construction of the body as aesthetic project in dance.

Professor Pickard has also developed a number of participatory, knowledge exchange and enterprise projects with a range of partners. She has held a number of senior leadership and research roles within the University and has led large projects at School, Faculty and at University-level, with colleagues and with external partner institutions and organisations.

More about Dance and Dance Education courses at Canterbury Christ Church University: https://bit.ly/3qoc5m4