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The Allusionist

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A PODCAST ABOUT LANGUAGE
BY HELEN ZALTZMAN

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The Allusionist

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Allusionist 19: Architecting About Dance

September 23, 2015 The Allusionist
Dance Boggle board.png

"Talking about music is like dancing about architecture" is a problematic statement: not just because nobody can agree on who came up with it, but because dancing about architecture doesn't seem particularly far-fetched. Talking about dance,

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“Talking about music is like dancing about architecture” is a problematic statement: not just because nobody can agree on who came up with it, but because dancing about architecture doesn’t seem particularly far-fetched. Talking about dance, however - that's really difficult. How do you put a wordless form of communication into words?

Audio describer Alice Sanders and choreographer Steven Hoggett take the issue for a twirl.

READING ABOUT DANCE IS LIKE READING ABOUT ARCHITECTURE:

  • If you want to find out more about "[doing a thing] about [a thing] is like [doing a different thing] about [another thing]" adages, take a look here and here.

  • Further werewolf reading-matter: find out about Old English wolf-words; read this plea for feminist werewolves/wifwolves; and this, apparently, is The Problem with Female Werewolves (too hairy for this bikini-waxed world?).

  • You want to learn Labanotation? Don't let me stop you.

  • You want to learn about the Step Up series of films? Don't let me stop you.

  • Steven Hoggett talks more about how he goes about his work, here and here.

  • Here is the transcript of this episode.

RANDOMLY SELECTED WORD FROM THE DICTIONARY:
poetaster

CREDITS:

  • Alice Sanders writes very funny articles and blogs. Find her at twitter.com/wernerspenguin.

  • Steven Hoggett is working on exciting forthcoming projects including the stage adaptation of Disney's Pinocchio, AND the Harry Potter play. You'll have to wait a little while for those; but his Burt Bacharach show, Close To You, is about to open at London's Criterion Theatre. The Curious Incident of the Dog In The Night-Time is on in the UK and on Broadway, and Once seems to be all over the place.

  • The non-speech noises in this episode were:

  1. Allusionist Theme by Martin Austwick

  2. The Nutcracker, Swan Lake and Sleeping Beauty by Tchaikovsky

  3. A snippet of the film version of A Chorus Line

  4. Cinderella by Prokofiev

This episode was produced by me, Helen Zaltzman. Thanks to Eleanor McDowall and Miranda Sawyer.

Dance along to facebook.com/allusionistshow, twitter.com/allusionistshow and twitter.com/helenzaltzman.

- HZ

In episodes Tags words, language, history, gender, sexism, werewolf, werewolves, man, female, woman, women, sexist, dance, dancing, Step Up, Alice Sanders, Steven Hoggett, choreography, movement, Labanotation, stage, theatre, theater, performance, actors, dancers, film, movies, TV, television, entertainment, non-verbal communication, wordless, Old English, A Chorus Line, ballet, classical ballet, repetiteurs, choreographers, books, literature, documentation, musicality, person, Latin, audio description
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