Biography

Dr Jenny Roche is a dance artist who has worked as a contemporary dancer since the early 1990s performing with a wide range of choreographers in Ireland and internationally, including Michael Keegan-Dolan (Ire), Janet Smith (UK), Rosemary Butcher (UK), Jodi Melnick (NYC), John Jasperse (NYC), Yoshiko Chuma (NYC) and in work by Dominique Bagouet, re-staged by Les Carnets Bagouet (France). She has danced for Daghdha Dance Company, Dance Theatre of Ireland, Irish Modern Dance Theatre, Cois Ceim and was a founder member of Fabulous Beast Dance Theatre. She co-founded Rex Levitates Dance Company (now Liz Roche Company) with her sister, choreographer Liz Roche in 1999 and has performed extensively with the company, most notably in the Meet in Beijing Festival, China, in 2006 and the Baryshnikov Arts Centre, NYC, in 2011.In 2001, she completed her Masters degree in Dance Performance at the Irish World Academy of Music and Dance, at the University of Limerick and in 2010 she received her doctoral award from Roehampton University, London. Her thesis title was Moving Identities: Multiplicity, Embodiment and the Contemporary Dancer and her area of research continues to be the dancer's creative practice within choreographic processes.From 2007 to 2011, she was Dance Adviser to the Arts Council of Ireland/An Chomhairle Ealaion. She served as a committee member of the Step up: Dance Project, Ireland, a professional development programme for recently graduated contemporary dancers and was project manager of the inaugural year of the programme. She is currently completing her final year of Amatsu soft tissue therapy bodywork. Jenny continues to work as a performer and choreographer. In recent years, she performed in Time Over Distance Over Time, a collaborative work with Liz Roche Company that took place between Ireland and Australia, with performances in Dublin Dance Festival, Dance Bytes in Sydney and The Brisbane Powerhouse in 2016 and Alternately Terrific Gentle, a collaboration with Liz Roche and Jodi Melnick, performed in Lightmoves Festival of Screendance, Limerick (2023). She has recently collaborated with choreographer Carol Brown and digital artists Gibson/Martelli on a dance film/installation presented in the Pah Gallery, New Zealand in 2017 and Ars Electronica in 2020. She collaborated with Gibson/Martelli and composer Mel Mercier on the performance installation Expanded Fields, Limerick City Gallery of Art (2019), Gazelli Arthouse and Live Collision Festival (2020). Her mongraph, Multiplicity, Embodiment and the Contemporary Dancer: Moving Identities was published by Palgrave Macmillan in 2015 and Choreography: The Basics, with Stephanie Burridge in 2022.

Research Interests

At the core of my research are questions emerging from the phenomenological perspective of dancers who are both live self-aware participants in the choreographic process and the material through which the choreography is realised and the dance formed. Through practical enquiry and experimentation based on my own experience as a dancer and the experiences of other dancers working within this genre, I continue to explore how contemporary dancers' embodied knowledge unfolds through the choreographic process. My research extends into the fields of dance and somatic practices, particularly in relation to the influence of somatic approaches on dance training. I have had an international career as a dancer, choreographer and artistic director for over twenty years and continue to work on projects within arts practice research contexts.

I have a broad range of skills as a researcher, moving between academic scholarship, arts policy and creative practice contexts. I have published extensively on a range of subjects including creative practice and dance training. Aside from publishing, I have also worked as a collaborator on interdisciplinary creative practice outputs with international artists in recent years. Most recently, Time Over Distance Over Time, which received highly competitive Australia Council funding, was performed in Australia and Ireland and brought together artists and researchers from Ireland, the UK and Australia to develop a new creative work, which was also funded by the Arts Council of Ireland and Culture Ireland. It involved an international collaboration across a range of venues, festivals, production companies and funders in a highly complex project. In January 2017, I worked with digital artists Ruth Gibson and Bruno Martelli and choreographer Carol Brown (Associate Professor from the University of Auckland), to develop a film installation, We Are Here And We Are Everywhere At Once, filmed in Central Otago, New Zealand and presented in galleries in Auckland and London. In 2019, I collaborated with Gibson/Martelli and composer Mel Mercier on Expanded Fields, presented at Limerick City Gallery of Art (2019), Gazelli Arthouse, London and Live Collision Festival, Dublin (2020).

Peer Reviewed Journals

2021

And then again, I draw myself to the detail: Capturing experiential states in contemporary dance making through Expanded Fields

Gibson, R;Roche, J (2021) And then again, I draw myself to the detail: Capturing experiential states in contemporary dance making through Expanded Fields. ABINGDON Performance Research :71-77

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2019

Writing Wrongheaded

(2019) Writing Wrongheaded. Social Alternatives

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2018

Traces from elsewhere: dancing together across distance and time

Roche J. (2018) Traces from elsewhere: dancing together across distance and time. Text And Performance Quarterly :5-14

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2016

Shifting embodied perspectives in dance teaching

Jenny Roche (2016) Shifting embodied perspectives in dance teaching. Journal Of Dance And Somatic Practices. 8(2), Pp. 143-156.

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2015

Creative adaptations: integrating Feldenkrais principles in contemporary dance technique to facilitate the transition into tertiary dance education

Roche, J;Huddy, A (2015) Creative adaptations: integrating Feldenkrais principles in contemporary dance technique to facilitate the transition into tertiary dance education. ABINGDON Theatre Dance And Performance Training :145-158

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2013

Review: "Body and Performance" edited by: Sandra Reeve, Triarchy Press (2013)

Jenny Roche (2013) Review: "Body and Performance" edited by: Sandra Reeve, Triarchy Press (2013). Journal Of Dance And Somatic Practices. 5(2), Pp. 197-198.

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2011

Embodying Multiplicity: The independent dancer's moving identity

Roche, Jennifer (2011) Embodying Multiplicity: The independent dancer's moving identity. Research In Dance Education :105-118

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2009

Moving identities : multiplicity, embodiment and the contemporary dancer

(2009) Moving identities : multiplicity, embodiment and the contemporary dancer. Phd By Creative Works, Roehampton University London.

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2008

Solo3 [Live Performance (Dance)]

(2008) Solo3 [Live Performance (Dance)] .

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Books

2022

Choreography: The Basics

Jenny Roche and Stephanie Burridge (2022) Choreography: The Basics. London and New York : Routledge

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2015

Multiplicity, Embodiment and the Contemporary Dancer: Moving Identities

Roche, Jennifer (2015) Multiplicity, Embodiment and the Contemporary Dancer: Moving Identities. London : Palgrave Macmillan

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Book Chapters

2020

Towards a Deterritorialised Field of Dance

Carol Brown, Ruth Gibson and Jenny Roche (2020) Towards a Deterritorialised Field of Dance. London and New York : Dance Books Dance Fields: Staking a Claim for Dance Studies in the Twenty-First Century

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2019

Liz Roche's Pilgrimage: Shifts in Perception through Proximity to a Dance

Jenny Roche (2019) Liz Roche's Pilgrimage: Shifts in Perception through Proximity to a Dance . Cobh, Co.Cork : Paper Visual Art/Sirius Arts Centre ONE HERE NOW: The Brian O'Doherty/Patrick Ireland Project

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2018

What would it be if it didn't have to be like that?: Undisciplining the travel of dance ideas in the Neo-liberal university

Jenny Roche and Alys Longley (2018) What would it be if it didn't have to be like that?: Undisciplining the travel of dance ideas in the Neo-liberal university. Newcastle Upon Tyne : Cambridge Scholars Publishing Undisciplining Dance in Nine Movements and Eight Stumbles :49-57

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2018

Dancing, Identity and Place: Balancing Subjectivity and Technique in Contemporary Dance Training

Jenny Roche (2018) Dancing, Identity and Place: Balancing Subjectivity and Technique in Contemporary Dance Training. Cham, Switzerland : Palgrave Macmillan Dance Matters in Ireland: Contemporary Dance Performance and Practice :125-143

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2018

Dancing strategies and moving identities: The contributions independent contemporary dancers make to the choreographic process

Jenny Roche (2018) Dancing strategies and moving identities: The contributions independent contemporary dancers make to the choreographic process. London and New York : Routledge Contemporary Choreography: A Critical Reader :150-164

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2017

Moving between first-person and third-person bodies in dance teaching

(2017) Moving between first-person and third-person bodies in dance teaching. Practicing Dance: A Somatic Orientation. Logos Verlag, Berlin, pp. 123-126.

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2016

Moving between first-person and third-person bodies in dance teaching

Jenny Roche (2016) Moving between first-person and third-person bodies in dance teaching. Berlin : Logos Verlag Practicing Dance:A Somatic Orientation :123-126

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2015

Dancing as knowledge production/dancer as researcher in practice-led research

Roche, Jenny (2015) Dancing as knowledge production/dancer as researcher in practice-led research. Lisbon : University of Lisbon Research in Arts: The Oscillation of the Methods :105-117

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2015

Disorganising principles: Corporeal fragmentation and the possibilities for repair

Jenny Roche (2015) Disorganising principles: Corporeal fragmentation and the possibilities for repair. UK : Triarchy Press Attending to Movement: Somatic Perspectives on Living in This World

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2015

Disorganising principles: Corporeal fragmentation and the possibilities for repair

(2015) Disorganising principles: Corporeal fragmentation and the possibilities for repair. Attending to Movement: Somatic Perspectives on Living in This World - Conference. 2013 : Centre for Dance Research, Coventry University. Axminster, England : Triarchy Press

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2015

Dancing as Knowledge Production/Dancer as Researcher in Practice-led Research

(2015) Dancing as Knowledge Production/Dancer as Researcher in Practice-led Research. In Quaresma, Jose & Dias, Fernando Rosa (Eds.) Research in Arts: The Oscillation of the Methods. University of Lisbon, Lisbon, Portugal, pp. 105-117.

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Edited Books

This author has not written any publications of this type yet.

Other Journals

2015

Perceiving the interactive body in dance: Enhancing kinesthetic empathy through art objects

Smith, Michael and Roche, Jennifer (2015) Perceiving the interactive body in dance: Enhancing kinesthetic empathy through art objects. Body, Space and Technology

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Conference Publications

2015

International Symposium for Dance Studies: Perspectives on Dance in a Changing Environment. 17 October 2015, Korea National University of the Arts, South Korea.

Jenny Roche (2015) International Symposium for Dance Studies: Perspectives on Dance in a Changing Environment. 17 October 2015, Korea National University of the Arts, South Korea. .

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2015

International Symposium for Dance Studies: Perspectives on Dance in a Changing Environment

Roche, Jenny (2015) International Symposium for Dance Studies: Perspectives on Dance in a Changing Environment.

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2015

Atelier: European Dance House Network, 11-12 December 2015, Dance House, Dublin.

Jenny Roche (2015) Atelier: European Dance House Network, 11-12 December 2015, Dance House, Dublin..

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2012

Mapping Spectral Traces; NUI Galway and Maynooth

Jennifer Roche (2012) Mapping Spectral Traces; NUI Galway and Maynooth.

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2012

Dance Research Forum of Ireland 4th International Conference

Jennifer Roche (2012) Dance Research Forum of Ireland 4th International Conference.

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2012

Somatics and Technology Conference, University of Chichester

Jennifer Roche (2012) Somatics and Technology Conference, University of Chichester.

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Conference Contributions

2018

Conference of Irish Geographers

Jenny Roche (2018) Conference of Irish Geographers.

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2018

Panpapanpalya; 2nd joint congress of daCi (dance and the Child international) and WDA (World Dance Alliance) Global Education and Training Network

Jenny Roche (2018) Panpapanpalya; 2nd joint congress of daCi (dance and the Child international) and WDA (World Dance Alliance) Global Education and Training Network.

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2015

Atelier: European Dance House Network

Jenny Roche (2015) Atelier: European Dance House Network.

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Published Reports

2016

The Arts Council Dance and Education Report: Reshaping the Landscape: A Pathway to Professional Dance Training of International Standing in Ireland

Jenny Roche (2016) The Arts Council Dance and Education Report: Reshaping the Landscape: A Pathway to Professional Dance Training of International Standing in Ireland. Dublin : The Arts Council

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Editorials

This author has not written any publications of this type yet.

Book Reviews

This author has not written any publications of this type yet.

Other Publications

2019

Expanded Fields

Jenny Roche, Ruth Gibson and Bruno Martelli (2019) Expanded Fields.

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2017

We Are Here And We Are Everywhere At Once

Carol Brown, Ruth Gibson, Bruno Martelli and Russell Scoones (2017) We Are Here And We Are Everywhere At Once.

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2016

Time Over Distance Over Time

Liz Roche (2016) Time Over Distance Over Time .

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