Stories Ballet Teachers Tell: bell hooks’s “confessional narratives” as Liberatory Pedagogical Praxis in the Ballet Class

Abstract:

I have vivid memories of my ballet teachers telling stories in class about their lives and experiences as dancers. Their stories often left me feeling both gleefully inspired and woefully inadequate. Coming from those who’ve achieved status in the profession, the stories ballet teachers tell can encourage and motivate, but they can also reinforce ballet’s most oppressive power structures—those steeped in white supremacy, patriarchy, and idealized bodies.

Throughout her work, activist-educator-scholar bell hooks describes “confessional narratives”: an approach to storytelling that facilitates the learning of academic content. The pedagogical skill required to craft these narratives includes distilling self-perceptions, memories, and experiences into stories that both reveal the identity of the teacher and illuminate the material content of a class. Given that knowledge in ballet is passed through the subjective frameworks of dancers’ bodies, I propose that teachers’ sharing of their unique perspectives through curated “confessional narratives” can support the development of what hooks calls an “authentic learning community” in the ballet class (Teaching Critical Thinking, 57).

In this research, phenomenology and autoethnography drive the methodology, as I reflect on and draw meaning from my experiences as a student and teacher of ballet. Bringing my reflections into conversation with extant literature, I briefly examine two types of stories: those that reinforce ballet’s systems of oppression and those that support liberatory pedagogical praxis. I propose that bell hooks’s “confessional narratives” can lead to the latter in ballet, so I theorize their implications and applications in the ballet class.

 

Bibliography:

  • brown, adrienne maree. Emergent Strategy: Shaping Change, Changing Worlds. Chico, CA: AK Press, 2017.
  • Brown, Nyama McCarthy. Dance Pedagogy for a Diverse World: Culturally Relevant Teaching in Theory, Research and Practice. Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 2022.
  • Eyler, Joshua R. How Humans Learn: The Science and Stories behind Effective College Teaching Morgantown: West Virginia University Press, 2018.
  • Goldman, Ilana, and Paige Cunningham. “Dear Ballet Teachers, Let’s Talk about Race.” In Antiracism in Ballet Teaching, edited by Kate Mattingly and Iyun Ashani Harrison. New York: Routledge, 2024.
  • hooks, bell. Remembered Rapture: The Writer at Work. New York: Holt, 1999.
  • hooks, bell. Teaching Critical Thinking: Practical Wisdom. New York: Routledge, 2010.
  • hooks, bell. Teaching to Transgress: Education as the Practice of Freedom. New York: Routledge, 1994. 21.
  • Ladson-Billings, Gloria. Culturally Relevant Pedagogy: Asking a Different Question. New York: Teachers College Press, 2021.
  • Mattingly, Kate, and Iyun Ashani Harrison, eds. Antiracism in Ballet Teaching. New York: Routledge, 2024.
  • Zeller, Jessica. Humanizing Ballet Pedagogies: Philosophies, Perspectives, and Praxis for Teaching Ballet. New York: Routledge, 2025.

 

Presented by Jessica Zeller, Professor; Texas Christian University

 

Biography:

Jessica Zeller is an educator, dancer, partner, friend, daughter, sister, colleague, and scholar. She is a Professor of Dance in the TCU School for Classical & Contemporary Dance, where she teaches in the ballet and dance studies areas of the curriculum. Zeller holds a PhD in Dance Studies and an MFA in Dance from The Ohio State University.

Zeller’s new book, Humanizing Ballet Pedagogies: Philosophies, Perspectives, and Praxis for Teaching Ballet (Routledge, 2025), theorizes how ballet pedagogies develop and proposes praxis-based approaches for humanistic, equitable teaching. Sherrie Barr notes in her review that Zeller, “does not shy away from critically examining ballet traditions that have promoted its authoritarian pedagogical practices” and identifies the book as a “call-to-action for teachers of all dance genres and in all contexts to reflect upon the potential of humanizing our pedagogy for dance students.” Zeller’s 2016 book, Shapes of American Ballet: Teachers and Training before Balanchine (Oxford University Press), situates the teachings of European and Russian ballet pedagogues in the context of American Capitalism during the under-researched early twentieth century period in American ballet history.

Zeller’s research appears in journals and anthologies, including the forthcoming Oxford Handbook of Ballet Pedagogy and the Journal of Dance Education. She facilitates pedagogy workshops for faculty and students, most recently at the Rambert School and the University of Oklahoma School of Dance. Zeller She was Scholar-in-Residence at Temple University and is a past President of CORPS de Ballet International.