Katherine Dunham

Common card · No. 226252

Katherine Mary Dunham (June 22, 1909 – May 21, 2006) was an American dancer, choreographer, anthropologist, and social activist. One of the most renowned modern dance artists of the 20th century, she has been called the "matriarch and queen mother of black dance." While a student at the University of Chicago, Dunham also performed as a dancer, ran a dance school and earned an early bachelor's degree in anthropology. Receiving a postgraduate academic fellowship, she went to the Caribbean to study the African diaspora, ethnography and local dance. She returned to graduate school and submitted a master's thesis to the anthropology faculty. She did not complete the other requirements for that degree, however, as she realized that her professional calling was performance and choreography. At the height of her career in the 1940s and 1950s, Dunham was renowned throughout Europe and Latin America and was widely popular in the United States. The Washington Post called her "dancer Katherine the...

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