BA (Hons), MA, PhD
Instructor, English
Faculty of Arts and Sciences
School of Humanities
English
604.986.1911 ext. 2019
Fir Building, room FR 464
alanagerecke@capilanou.ca
Education
PhD, English, Simon Fraser University, 2016.
MA, English, Specialization in Performance Studies, Simon Fraser University, 2009.
BA, English (Honours), Extended Minor in Dance, Simon Fraser University, 2006.
Bio
Alana Gerecke (PhD, Simon Fraser University, 2016) is a settler scholar and dance artist based in Vancouver, on the unceded traditional territories of the Squamish, Musqueam and Tsleil-Waututh nations. Her academic and artistic research practices cohere around embodied assembly. Gerecke holds a PhD from Simon Fraser University, where she pursued dissertation research on the urban spatial politics of site-based dance. She has taught at Simon Fraser University, the University of the Fraser Valley, and other institutions, and she recently completed a Banting Postdoctoral Fellowship at York University (2016-19).
Gerecke continues to create, perform and publish widely – most recently in Performance Matters Journal, Canadian Theatre Research and The Futures of Dance Studies. She is the mama of two objectively adorable small humans.
I teach intro to writing, literature and performance, and critical theory courses, as well as studio-based movement courses. My teaching works toward the development of cultural literacy, resource literacy, and clear communication skills by building carefully scaffolded writing-as-thinking exercises and assignments.
In all of my teaching, I work to bring embodied and writing-based ways of knowing together, tuning our sensitivity to the material environment and the places that support us.
My research combines artistic and academic methods to examine official and unofficial choreographies through urban space--from aerial dances sited on buildings to your daily commute. I am interested in what these "everyday choreographies" can tell us about how we relate to the spaces and people around us, and I'm curious about how these choreographies can both model and prompt shifts in these relations. Sometimes, my research takes the form of scholarly publications (like my current book project, Moving Publics), and sometimes it takes the form of a collaboratively developed participatory dance piece.
All of my work reflects my deep belief in the value of the arts as ways of knowing and as methods for enacting social change.
Gerecke, Alana. "Sidewalk Choreographies: The Politics of Moving Along in Battery Opera's Lives Were Around Me." The Futures of Dance Studies. Eds. Susan Manning, Janice Ross, and Rebecca Schneider. Wisconsin UP, 245-63. 2020.
Gerecke, Alana. "A Choreopolitics of Topography: Feeling for Lower Ground in Karen Jamieson's The River." Performance Matters 5.1: 25-46. 2019.
Gerecke, Alana and Mary Fogarty, eds. "Backspace: A Special Issue on Dance Studies" Special Edition of Performance Matters 5.1. 2019.
Gerecke, Alana and Laura Levin, eds. "Choreographies of Assembly Special Edition of Canadian Theatre Review 176. 2018.
Jack and Doris Shadbolt Fellowship in the Humanities in Urban Studies at SFU, 2021-22.
Artist-In-Residence, The Dance Centre, Vancouver, 2020-22.
Canadian Association for Theatre Research (CATR)'s Robert Lawrence Prize for best conference paper, 2019 (Honourable Mentioned earned in both 2016 and 2012).
Banting Postdoctoral Fellowship, York University, 2016-20.
Summer School Scholarship, Mellon Foundation Dance Studies, 2016 and 2013.
Trudeau Foundation Doctoral Scholarship, Simon Fraser University, 2011-15
CGS Doctoral Scholarship, Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC), 2009-12.
Queen's Fellowship (SSHRC-allocated award for one outstanding Canadian doctoral student), 2009.
CGS Master's Scholarship, Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC), 2008-09.