Biography
BA, creative arts, Manchester Metropolitan University
MA, dance studies, University of Surrey, UK
PhD, University of Surrey, UK
Dr. Dodds joined the Boyer College in 2011 as Chair of Dance and, on completing this term of office in 2016, became the Director of the Institute of Dance Scholarship from 2016-19. In fall 2019, she took on the position of Graduate Programs Coordinator. Prior to joining the Temple faculty, Dr. Dodds served as Senior Lecturer in Dance Studies, Head of the Department of Dance, Film and Theatre, and Director of Postgraduate Research at the University of Surrey. She served on the Executive Committee of the Society for Dance Research (SDR) from 1998-2001, the Board of Directors for the Society of Dance History Scholars (SDHS) from 2004-2010, and the Executive Board of the Congress of Research in Dance (CORD) from 2012-15. She is currently Vice-President of Publications & Research for the Dance Studies Association.
She is a founder member of the UK PoPMOVES research group and initiated the SDHS Popular, Social and Vernacular Dance Working Group. In 2008 and 2009, she was an Erasmus Visiting Lecturer at Trondheim University in Norway, in 2010 she was a Visiting Academic at the Centre for Cultural Research at Griffith University in Australia, in 2014 she was a Distinguished Faculty member of the Mellon Summer Seminar: Dance Studies in/and the Humanities at Stanford University, and in 2017 she was a visiting scholar for the Choreomundus program at Blaise-Pascal University in France.
Her research expertise centers on dance on screen, popular dance, and cultural theory approaches to dance. She is also an active b-girl in the Philadelphia breaking scene.
Works and Publications
Books
2019 The Bloomsbury Companion to Dance Studies (Bloomsbury Methuen)
2019 The Oxford Handbook of Dance and Competition (Oxford University Press)
2013 Bodies of Sound: Studies Across Popular Music and Dance (co-edited with Susan Cook) (Ashgate)
2011 Dancing on the Canon: Embodiments of Value in Popular Dance (Palgrave)
2001 Dance on Screen: Genres and Media from Hollywood to Experimental Art (Palgrave)
Book Chapters
Crashing Creatively: Trial and Error in the Hip Hop Battle Error, Ambiguity, Creativity: Multidisciplinary Perspectives Sarah Whatley and Sita Popat (eds) Palgrave (in press)
2019 Popular Dance The Bloomsbury Companion to Dance Studies Sherril Dodds (ed) Bloomsbury Methuen (in press)
2019 Loss of Face: Intimidation, Derision, and Failure in the Hip Hop Battle The Oxford Handbook of Dance and Competition Sherril Dodds (ed) Oxford University Press
2015 Dancing the Popular: The Expressive Interface of Bodies, Sound and Motion The Sage Handbook of Popular Music Andrew Bennett and Steve Waksman (eds) Sage
2014 Values in Motion: Reflections on Popular Screen Dance The Oxford Handbook of Dance and the Popular Screen (ed) Oxford University Press
2013 Bellowhead: Re-entering Folk through a Pop Movement Aesthetic. Bodies of Sound Sherril Dodds and Susan Cook (eds) Ashgate
2009 Slamming with the Boundaries of Theory and Practice: The Legitimization of Popular Dance Routledge Dance Studies Reader Alexandra Carter and Janet O’Shea (eds) Routledge
2008 From Busby Berkely to Madonna: Music Video and Popular Dance Ballroom, Boogie, Shimmy, Sham, Shake: A Social and Popular Dance Reader Julie Malnig (ed) University of Illinois Press
2008 Mad Hot Ballroom and The Politics of Transformation Decentring Texts Janet Lansdale (ed) Palgrave
2005 Screen Divas: An Expression of the Grotesque Aesthetic Anarchic Dance Liz Aggiss and Billy Cowie (eds) Routledge
2003 Revolution in Video Dance: The Construction of a Fluid Body in IndeterminateBodies Naomi Segal, Roger Cook and Lib Taylor (eds) MacMillan
2002 Music Video/Video Dance Music, Sensation and Sensuality Linda Austern (ed) Garland
1999 A “streetwise urban chic”: Popular Culture and Intertextuality in the Work of Lea Anderson Dancing Texts Janet Adshead-Lansdale (ed) Dance Books
1997 Dance and Erotica: The Construction of the Female Stripper Dance in the City Helen Thomas (ed) Macmillan
Referee Journals
2019 On Watching Dance International Journal of Screendance
2018 The Brutal Encounters of a Novice B-Girl Choreographic Practices
2016 Hip Hop Battles and Facial Intertexts Dance Research
2014 Krumping, Choreography and Close-ups: A Deleuzian Critique of ‘So You Think You Can Dance’ International Journal of Screendance (co-authored with Colleen Hooper)
2014 Guest editor ‘Body Parts: Pelvis, Feet, Face, Hips, Legs, Lips and Teeth’ Dance Research Journal
2014 Facial Choreographies and the Choreographic Interface Dance Research Journal*
*Winner of the 2015 Gertrude Lippincott Award. Named in honor of its donor, a devoted teacher of modern dance in the Midwest and mentor to many students, Gertrude Lippincott Award was established to recognize excellence in the field of dance scholarship.
2014 Embodied Transformations in Neo Burlesque Striptease Dance Research Journal
2011 Re-inventing the Past at Sunday Serenade: the Residual Cultures of a British Caribbean Dancehall Anthropological Notebooks
2009 Guest editor ‘Dancing Across Film, Television and the Digital Screen’ International Journal of Performance Arts and Digital Media
1997 Gesture, Pop Culture, and Intertextuality in the Work of Lea Anderson New Theatre Quarterly