Abstract:
Dance has long been valued as a pastime for the elderly in China, and in more recent years
promoted as a learning activity through the 62,000 Senior Citizens’ Universities (or
Universities of the Third Age) across the country. While these institutes may provide a valuable
hub for lifelong learning and social integration for the elderly, it can be important to question
the pedagogical approaches to dance being developed and extended within them, particularly
given the social vulnerability of elderly people. Within the wider context of China, secondary
and tertiary dance education has been extensively critiqued for its maintenance of authoritarian
pedagogies. Anecdotal evidence suggested that this may also be a key concern within Senior
Citizens’ Universities, so within this thesis I explore: How do elderly dance students experience
authoritarian dance teaching in a Senior Citizens’ University in China?
Through qualitative interviews, I gather four elderly learners’ stories and perspectives, all of
whom at some point either completely gave up dancing, or transferred from classes, because
of authoritarian teaching approaches. By employing a Foucauldian critical paradigm, I consider
how power might be negotiated and established as a discourse within an educational
environment. This first involved identifying what my interviewees perceived to be examples
of authoritarian teaching practices, including humiliation and physical punishment. My study
went on to explore how the elderly learners themselves are engaged in acts that actively sustain
this authoritarian pedagogic discourse, including their assumptions regarding the knowledge
superiority of the teacher and their obligation to be obedient as a model student. While their
stories present compelling illustrations of how authoritarian pedagogies may be continuing
within dance classes for the elderly in China, this study provokes a wider conversation on dance,
discourse and education for the elderly.
