Walk with Wente: Nina Lucas
President Wente walks and talks with Nina Lucas, Professor of Dance, about how combining dance and academics is a win-win for students at Wake Forest. They discuss teaching students how to connect something in their lives with dance, the benefits of dance as a communication tool, and the need to stay authentic and explore.
More about Nina Lucas:
Professor of Dance
Nina Lucas has been a member of the faculty since 1996, and she has served in many capacities, including Director of Dance, Chair of the Department of Theatre and Dance and the Artistic Director of the Dance Company. After pursuing a performing career, she received her MFA from UCLA. Her scholarly and creative work includes numerous examples of performance and choreography. At Wake Forest, she has created more than 20 modern and jazz works for the dance company and served as choreographer for many theatrical productions.
Her scholarly research includes compiling biographies of 20th century jazz choreographers with an emphasis on Black choreographers. From this research, she designed two First Year Seminars:”African American Choreographers in the 20th Century” and “Jazz Dance: Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow.” Her published work includes a chapter on Dancing as Protest: Three African American Choreographers 1940-1960 in the book “Trauma and Resilience in American Indian and African American Southern History,” edited by Wake Forest faculty members Ulrike Wiethaus and Anthony Parent Jr.
In February 2001, she was awarded the Reid-Doyle excellence in Teaching Award from Wake Forest.
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