Transversal Re/Configurations: Flesh, Bodies, and Matter in Motion
2026 Current Topics in Dance Research Colloquium Series
January 08 – March 12, 2026
Working within and against the categories of dance, music, embodiment, and aesthetics, this series explores the in/commensurability between (un)worldings through transversal re/configurations of flesh, materiality, and entanglement; objects and/as bodies (and vice-versa); spectral, spectacular, and telluric agencies; digital and diasporic transits; and ceremony on ruins and across dreamscapes as survivance against catastrophe.
Following the transversal, the 2026 Colloquium “Transversal Re/Configurations: Flesh, Bodies, and Matter in Motion” seeks to deepen intradisciplinary connections and unsettle hierarchies of knowledge by intersecting with both the “Critical Dance Experiments” Graduate Student Conference and “From Earthbeings to the Anthropo-Not-Seen: Towards a Politics of Relation,” a conference coordinated by María del Rosario Acosta López (Professor, Hispanic Studies). The “Rimanukay” with Marisol de la Cadena was co-curated with Eloy Neira de la Cadena (Doctoral Candidate, Ethnomusicology) as part of “From Earthbeings to the Anthropo-Not-Seen.” Rizvana Bradley’s participation in the “Transversal Re/Configurations” Colloquium was co-curated with Erika Villeroy da Costa (Doctoral Student, Critical Dance Studies), while Mlondi Zondi’s participation in the Colloquium and “Critical Dance Experiments” was curated by the 2026 Dance GSA “Critical Dance Experiments” Conference Organizing Committee.
– María Regina Firmino-Castillo, 2026 Colloquium Curator & Coordinator
SCHEDULE
“dance work” by taisha paggett
“digital landscaping and practices of de/compression” by Joel Mejia Smith
Photo Credits: Joel Mejia Smith, 2018 (left), taisha paggett, production still, by meital yaniv, 2024 (right)
Jan 08
3:15 – 4:50 PM
INTS 1109
“Intercaste Intimacies and the Making of the Modern Guru” by Anusha Kedhar
“Hollywood Dance-ins and the Reproduction of Bodies” by Anthea Kraut
“Mythologies and Other Contemporary Narratives of Self and World Making” by Jose Luis Reynoso (Bello)
Marie Bryant and Vera Ellen in Ebony Magazine. Photo by Larry Barbier. Published by permission of the Barbier Estate in Anthea Kraut’s Hollywood Dance-ins and the Reproduction of Bodies (Oxford University Press, 2025).
Jan 15
2:00 – 4:50 PM
INTS 1109
“Imperial Hauntings & Spectral Choreographies of Survivance” by Heather Rastovac Akbarzadeh
“’La Muerte Sale por el Oriente:’ Reframing Feminicidal Space” by Nidia Bautista, with Xóchitl C. Chávez (respondent)
Photo Credits: ©Sonia Madrigal, La Muerte Sale por el Oriente, 2014-ongoing.
Jan 22
2:00 – 4:50 PM
INTS 1109 [hybrid]
“Performance as Ceremony: Indigenous Futurities” by Sam Aros-Mitchell
Photo Credit: Sam Aros-Mitchell performing in bison bison (dance_hum for dirtbath) from Duane Linklater: 12 + 2 | “buffalounit” (with Tanya Lukin Linklater). ©Don Stahl, 2025.
Jan 29
3:15 – 4:50 PM
INTS 1111
tusuy‑taki‑kuyta tirakunawan / dance‑song with earth‑beings
Marisol de la Cadena with Michelle Banks, Negar Kamali, M.R. Firmino-Castillo, and Eloy Neira de la Cadena (co-curator).
In collaboration with the Departments of Music & Hispanic Studies and part of the “From Earthbeings to the Anthropo-Not-Seen: Towards a Politics of Relation” Conference.
Photo Credits: Negar Kamali, “Where Does Distance Begin: On the Map or in the Skin?” by Slade Segerson, 2025.
Feb 05
4:30 – 5:30 PM
ARTS 166
“Performing Vulnerability: Risking Art and Life in the Burmese Diaspora” by Emily Hue
Photo of Emily Hue by Keith Miyake, 2025.
Feb 12
3:00 – 4:50 PM
ARTS 166
“Bearing the Unbearable: On the Minor Agonistics of Performance” by Rizvana Bradley
Co-curated with Erika Villeroy da Costa
Photo credits: Photo of Rizvana Bradley by Cassidy DuHon.
Feb 19
3:15 – 4:50 PM
INTS 1128
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“Critical Dreaming: Feminist Performances across the Indigenous Americas” by Lilian Mengesha
Photo credits: Photo of Lily Mengesha by María Fernanda Sánchez.
Feb 26
2:00 – 3:20 PM
INTS 1111
“The Loss of Loss: Dance and the Psychopolitics of Re-Assembly” by Mlondi Zondi
In collaboration with and curated by the “Critical Dance Experiments” Conference
Photo credits: ©Studio Kabako, 2018.
Mar 5
2:00 – 3:30 PM
ARTS 166 [hybrid]
REGISTER HERE
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Part of “Transversal Re/Configurations: Flesh, Bodies, and Matter in Motion” Current Topics in Dance Research Colloquium Series: January 08 – March 12, 2026: María Regina Firmino-Castillo, Curator & Coordinator
Transversal Re/Configurations: Flesh, Bodies, and Matter in Motion was made possible through generous sponsorships from the California Center for Native Nations; the Rupert Costo Endowment in American Indian Affairs, University of California, Riverside; the CHASS Dean’s Office and the Center for Ideas and Society; and the Departments of Music, Ethnic Studies, Gender & Sexuality Studies, and Media & Cultural Studies.
Many thanks to: taisha paggett (Department of Dance, Chairperson), Anthea Kraut (Department of Dance, Vice-Chair), Courtney Brubaker (Events Specialist), and Pete Pace (Technical Director) for their generous support of the Colloquium, and to Jonathan Ritter (Department of Music, Chairperson) and María del Rosario Acosta López (Professor, Hispanic Studies Department) for their vision and collaboration.
For Accessibility and Accommodations: Contact mariafc@ucr.edu.
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DANCE 280: CURRENT TOPICS IN DANCE RESEARCH (COLLOQUIUM)
Current Topics in Dance Research is an on-going Dance colloquium course that takes the format of a lecture/demonstration series by established and emerging scholars, performance artists, and dancers on interdisciplinary approaches to dance and the body, invited by the Department of Dance to share their work with the larger academic community of UC Riverside.
