Awards

• Winner of Winner of the 2019 Oscar G. Brockett Book Prize for Dance Research.

Overview

Dance in TV advertisements has long been familiar to Americans as a silhouette dancing against a colored screen, exhibiting moves from air guitar to breakdance tricks, all in service of selling the latest Apple product. But as author Colleen T. Dunagan shows in Consuming Dance, the advertising industry used dance to market items long before iPods. In this book, Dunagan lays out a comprehensive history and analysis of dance commercials to demonstrate the ways in which the form articulates with, informs, and reflects U.S. culture. In doing so, she examines dance commercials as cultural products, looking at the ways in which dance engages with television, film, and advertising in the production of cultural meaning. Throughout the book, Dunagan interweaves semiotics, choreographic analysis, cultural studies, and critical theory in an examination of contemporary dance commercials while placing the analysis within a historical context. She draws upon connections between individual dance-commercials and the discursive and production histories to provide a thorough look into brand identity and advertising's role in constructing social identities.

Full Product Details

9780190491376

Table of Contents

Reviews

Dunagan has crafted a smart, engaging analysis of the deployments of dance in television advertising. Written with playful enthusiasm, this book demonstrates how dance matters in contexts of commodities, marketplace, and the social lives of American consumption across three generations. Through original findings, based on years of careful research, Dunagan proves that dance in advertising reflects the changing standards of expressive labors of the body. - -Thomas F. DeFrantz, Author of Dancing Revelations: Alvin Ailey's Embodiment of African American Culture Dunagan's terrific book makes vital archival, historical, and theoretical interventions at the under-examined intersection of dance, advertising, and popular culture. Her compelling close readings of over sixty years of advertisements featuring spectacular dancing bodies helps us understand the work of dance-in-advertising in promoting consumption as a performance of identity. In the process, Consuming Dance greatly expands our understanding of how social and cultural meaning is made and remade in American popular culture. -- Brett Mizelle, Professor and Director of the American Studies Program at Long Beach State Consuming Dance shows how and why advertising agencies have leapt upon the spectacular art of dance to sell products. Through her meticulous readings of popular television commercials, Dunagan exposes the aesthetic, ideological, and affective work of dance in advertising. Much like the ads she explores, this book offers a compelling read for anyone interested in dance or media studies. -- Sherril Dodds, Professor of Dance, Temple University

Dunagan (California State Univ., Long Beach) offers smart, engaging analyses of deployments of dance in television advertising. She demonstrates how dance matters in contexts of commodities, marketplace, and the social lives of American consumption across three generations. Working with several theoretical models, Dunagan argues effectively that dance in advertising arrives as a part of American popular culture and as an active participant in disciplinary discourses....Summing up: Highly recommended. -- CHOICE Dunagan has crafted a smart, engaging analysis of the deployments of dance in television advertising. Written with playful enthusiasm, this book demonstrates how dance matters in contexts of commodities, marketplace, and the social lives of American consumption across three generations. Through original findings, based on years of careful research, Dunagan proves that dance in advertising reflects the changing standards of expressive labors of the body. - -Thomas F. DeFrantz, Author of Dancing Revelations: Alvin Ailey's Embodiment of African American Culture Dunagan's terrific book makes vital archival, historical, and theoretical interventions at the under-examined intersection of dance, advertising, and popular culture. Her compelling close readings of over sixty years of advertisements featuring spectacular dancing bodies helps us understand the work of dance-in-advertising in promoting consumption as a performance of identity. In the process, Consuming Dance greatly expands our understanding of how social and cultural meaning is made and remade in American popular culture. -- Brett Mizelle, Professor and Director of the American Studies Program at Long Beach State Consuming Dance shows how and why advertising agencies have leapt upon the spectacular art of dance to sell products. Through her meticulous readings of popular television commercials, Dunagan exposes the aesthetic, ideological, and affective work of dance in advertising. Much like the ads she explores, this book offers a compelling read for anyone interested in dance or media studies. -- Sherril Dodds, Professor of Dance, Temple University

Author Information

Colleen T. Dunagan is Professor of Dance at California State University, Long Beach.

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