Schooling the dancer: the evolution of an identity as a ballet dancer

This paper explores how young ballet dancers’ bodies are constructed and narrated through their desire to become performing ballet dancers. The schooling of the balletic body engages the young dancer in embodying the discipline of ballet and in developing a particular belief in a performing body. The embodied set of acquired dispositions that are inscribed into the dancer’s body are, in Pierre Bourdieu’s terms, a core part of the dancer’s habitus. This paper is based on a longitudinal, ethnographic, empirical study of the experiences of 12 young ballet dancers, 6 boys and 6 girls. These young people were aged between 10 and15 years at the start of the study and were tracked over a period of four years during the process of ‘becoming’ a ballet dancer as they engaged in non-residential ballet schooling. Data was generated via a multi-method approach. Findings suggest that the young dancers must demonstrate a willingness to accept emotional and physical suffering for the sake of ballet as a performance art and body as aesthetic project. They must therefore attach positive meaning to their experiences as they learn to deny, re-frame or suppress negative emotions.