• broken image

    Language | Movement | Education

    I reside on occupied Kumeyaay and Luiseño/Payómkawichum land. I study dance as a foundation for effective communication, personal transformation, and systemic change. I perform with Samahan Filipino American Performing Arts (National City) and Maraya Performing Arts (Chula Vista). My movement adapts and borrows from multiple dance forms, artists, and collectives, including Tausug and Sama groups of the Sulu archipelago.

  • Publications

    I weave personal narrative and practice-as-research to investigate dance, place, and power. I write for both academic and general readership.

    "Mamahay": beckoning home through movement and sound

    The Dancer-Citizen, Issue 12 (May 2021)

    Coverage of dance-film from choreographer Nikaio Thomashow in collaboration with musician Neko Cortez and dancers of Daloy Dance Company (Philippines), revealing democratic processes for asynchronous collaboration.

    thomas defrantz and Jaamil Olawale Kosoko at Moving Bodies, Social Justice

    thINKingDANCE (April 2021)

    Response and coverage of the workshops "Making*Queering*Dancing" and "The Transgressive Body Workshop" at the Moving Bodies, Social Justice symposium.

    Navigating Conflict Through Bharata Natyam

    A Month in Manila

    Dance Adventures: True Stories about Dancing Abroad

    Edited by Megan Taylor Morrison and Elisa Koshkina (December 2020)
    First-person narrative about learning the Amilbangsa Instructional Method in Manila, Philippines in January 2019. Written for students and general readership to complicate the desire to ¨return to roots¨ as a second-generation Filipina American.

    Dance film in 360: a narrative in National City

    The Dancer-Citizen, Issue 11 (November 2020)

    Personal narrative in an online, open-access, peer-reviewed scholarly journal exploring the work of socially engaged dance artists. A snapshot from the filming process of a "Maguindanao Suite" with Samahan Performing Arts and Pakaraguian Kulintang Ensemble. Explores the potential for 360-film cameras to assist performers in connecting with their collaborators and their site.

    Krystal Butler Choreographs Dance with Oberlin Students

    Oberlin Review, Arts (November 2019)

    News article with artist-in-residence, Pilobolus dancer Krystal Butler. Describes Butler's artistic mission and choreographic process with students at Oberlin College. Drew from concepts explored through "Contemporary Global Dance" course with Prof. Alysia Ramos.

  • Research

    "Moving Honestly - pangalay performance, national identity, and practice-as-research"
    1

    Apprenticeship, Samahan Arts

    2017 - 2019. Summer apprenticeships with Nico Delmundo at Samahan Filipino American Performing Arts.

    Weekly training in dance forms of the Philippines, where I learned Delmundo's "Linggisan" choreography.

    2

    Training, AlunAlun Dance Circle

    January 2019. Month-long intensive with AlunAlun Dance Circle (Manila). Learned basics of the Amilbangsa Instructional Method derived from pangalay. Travel sponsored by the Shansi In-Asia Winter Term Grant.

    3

    Private reading, Ann Cooper Albright

    Spring 2019. Initial drafts produced through private reading with Prof. Ann Cooper Albright, who introduced me to vital literature as well as frameworks of intertwined dancing/writing and personal narrative/research.

    4

    Revision, APDF Conference

    August 2020. Performed and presented work-in-progress at the Asia Pacific Dance Festival Conference. During the conference, received critical feedback from Dr. Desiree Quintero, whose scholarship deeply informed and redirected the project.

    5

    Honors Advising, Alysia Ramos

    January - May 2020. Honors thesis advising with Prof. Alysia Ramos. Ramos advised me to write "in conversation" with others, rather than attempt to write as an authority. This structured the final paper and allowed it to develop without the pretense of objectivity.

    6

    Collaborative practice-as-research

    February - May 2020. Six-week artistic collaboration with Madeleine Gefke and Neko Cortez, followed by independent movement research during COVID-19 pandemic. Revision, defense, and publication to OhioLINK Electronic Theses & Dissertation Center.

  • The project also drew from the following coursework taught by:

    Movement values, methods, orientations, and/or aesthetics drew from:
    Gratitude and credit to Meiver De La Cruz for her writing on attributions.
    "On Attributions (Part 1)." ig @prof_meiver, 2021

  • Teaching

    I guide discussion-based lessons for English-learners in higher education. I use games and true-to-life scenarios to help students speak and write with confidence.

    Academic Writing Instructor, Center for Cross-Cultural & Religious Studies at UGM

    Universitas Gadjah Mada, Yogyakarta, Indonesia (August 2020 - present)

    Co-instructor guiding academic writing workshops for graduate students. Topics include academic presentation, citation methods, crafting a proposal, and writing for confidence at the sentence level.

    English Speaking Instructor, Faculty of Cultural Studies at UGM

    Universitas Gadjah Mada, Yogyakarta, Indonesia (August 2020 - present)

    Facilitating English speaking tutorials for first-year English majors. Topics include expressing opinions, finding consensus, and speaking with confidence for academic presentation.

    Peer Advising Leader, Biology & Dance at Oberlin College

    Oberlin College, Oberlin, OH (August 2017 - December 2019)

    Led workshops for first-year students on navigating college life and learning. Topics included time management, professional communication, and finding extracurricular opportunities in their areas of interest.

  • Performances & Workshops

    I draw from contemporary concert dance traditions, as well as folk and regional dance forms of Southeast Asia.  My workshops prioritize deliberate, sustained movement that invites participants to imagine somatic and collective liberation.

    Forthcoming - Pangalay Workshop with EduMotion
    Pandanggo sa Ilaw Tutorial (remixed) for Shared Distance . January 2021
    International Solidarity to Defend Human Rights - virtual fundraiser (December 2020)
    SineKwento with Maraya Arts (November 2020)
    Shuffle a Dream - creative process (May 2020)
    Asia Pacific Dance Festival Conference - presentation and demo (August 2019)
    Foregone Territory - Oberlin Dance Project, Alysia Ramos & Nathan Trice (June 2018)
    ¨Side to Side¨ Embrace Me, with Tian Yoon Teh (November 2018)
    In-Asia Grant Presentation and Workshop at Oberlin College

  • News & Events

    I organize community events to resource Filipin@/x communities residing in the United States.

    Panelist at ARTs+Change Virtual Conference, June 5th, 2021.
    Demonstration, Q&A with Movement Exchange
    In the News: Kara Nepomuceno '20. Oberlin Shansi (October 2020).
    "‘A Month in Manila’: Local dancer featured in new dance anthology. Del Mar Times (October 2020)
    Performance-Based Courses, Capstones Transition Online. Oberlin Review, May 2020.
    Featured Researcher at Office of Undergraduate Research, Oberlin College
    Kulintang Workshop with Prof. Bernard Ellorin. Sponsored by Oberlin Filipinx American Student Association.
    Sulu Archipelago Dance Lecture and Workshop with Nico Delmundo. Sponsored by Oberlin Filipinx American Student Association.
    Midwest Asian American Student Conference at Oberlin College, April 2018
    Author panel with Prof. Harrod Suarez and author Mia Alvar (In the Country, 2016). Sponsored by Oberlin Filipinx American Student Association.

  • Proofreading & Editing Services

    I help artists and researchers to share their work with English-language academic communities and broader audiences.

    Proofreading

    I provide independent proofreading services for professors, lecturers, and graduate students for whom English is a second language. I make suggestions for grammar, spelling, and sentence flow. My work prioritizes concise language with attention to the guidelines of each publication.

     

    I have proofread numerous researchers at Gadjah Mada University (Yogyakarta, Indonesia) and Syiah Kuala University (Banda Aceh, Indonesia). Fields have included agriculture, molecular biology, organic chemistry, online pedagogy, and linguistics. I draw on a diverse liberal arts background to support publications in the sciences and humanities.

     

    Editing

    I provide independent editing services to artists sharing their stories with general audiences. I make suggestions for clear and expressive storytelling while prioritizing the author's voice. My experience in dance and culture writing supports narratives that move.

  • Blue circle with an icon of a yellow pencil pointing downwards.

    Inquiries:

    knepomuc@oberlin.edu

  • Kara Nepomuceno

    Language | Movement | Education

    Kara Nepomuceno is a 2020 - 2022 Oberlin Shansi Fellow to Universitas Gadjah Mada in Yogyakarta, Indonesia. She is writer for thINKingDANCE and a contributing author to the anthology, Dance Adventures: True Stories of Dance Abroad (ed. Megan Taylor Morrison, December 2020).

     

    Awarded the Shansi In-Asia Grant in January 2019, her study of the Amilbangsa Instructional Method in Manila, Philippines informed her undergraduate thesis on codified pangalay as a unifying aesthetic of Philippine national identity that obscures ongoing internal displacement of Tausug, Sama, and ¨Moro¨ groups in the archipelago. The project showed at the Asia Pacific Dance Festival Conference in August 2019 and received Highest Honors from Oberlin College.

     

    Her writings on dance use personal narrative and practice-as-research to engage discomforting truths with openness and curiosity. Her research interests are influenced by her parents' migration from the Philippines to the United States. Her dance practice borrows from multiple dance forms and sources, particularly communities in Southeast Asia. She dances with Maraya Performing Arts and Samahan Filipino American Performing Arts on Kumeyaay and Luiseño/Payómkawichum land.

     

    Kara received a BA in Biology and Dance at Oberlin College (2020). She holds a certificate in Teaching English as a Second Language through the Shansi Fellowship program (January 2020). She hold a certificate in intermediate Bahasa Indonesia from Alam Bahasa in Yogyakarta, Indonesia (December 2020).

  • I reside on the traditional homelands of the Kumeyaay and Luiseño/Payómkawichum. I support their continued fight to recover and protect their sacred sites, which have been destroyed by US border wall construction.

     

    I was raised alongside and am indebted to the resilient chaparral, the huutat, ektii, and other plant members of this sandy community. I draw breath from the Pacific and what is known as the San Elijo Lagoon. The rocky, iron-tinged canyons hold imprints of marine life from centuries past. I am grateful for the way they hold my weight.

     

    As I acknowledge the land, I work to center indigenous, land-based teachings in the ways I write, teach, move, and relate. I deeply thank and stive to move alongside Indigenous communities and scholars who continue to teach and demand the dismantling of settler colonial structures.

  • I am nurtured by and highly recommend these artists, educators, and organizations.

  • broken image
    broken image
    Cookie Use
    We use cookies to ensure a smooth browsing experience. By continuing we assume you accept the use of cookies.
    Learn More