For the Indian,dance is a personal form of prayer. When the Eagle Dancer puts on his costume,when he begins to dance to the music,he doesn't simply perform it; he actually becomes the eagle itself. The dancer is virtually inseparable from the dance.

We often take for granted the notion that some people are insiders, while others are outsiders. But such a notion is a social contrivance, that, like virtually every public construct, is a legacy of a primordial and tribal mentality.

White performances were always dull in comparison to the astonishing expressiveness of Black dancers. Behind the white person's inarticulate body were centuries of condemnation of dancing on religious grounds.

The nobility danced for the sake of social grace, to exhibit their finery...peasants danced to make themselves happy, to escape the routine of their life, and to meet their future wives and husbands.

We've reached a point where we are not a very empathetic people, and art without empathy is art without an audience. My basic viewpoint is that without art we're alone.

Dance in this century has remained primarily a personal ritual operating, like most avant-garde art, as an idiosyncratic form rather than a tribal expression of religious powers or a corporate expression of societal values.

Dance has been transformed from an involuntary motor discharge, a ceremonial rite, into a work of art, conscious of, intended for, observation.