Biography
As a prominent emerging scholar in dance studies, Takiyah Nur Amin, Ph.D. is Assistant Professor of World Dance at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. Dr. Amin teaches courses in dance history and theory in the liberal studies curriculum, Department of Dance and College of Art and Architecture Honors Program. She earned a Ph.D. in Dance with a concentration in Cultural Studies, Certificate in Women’s Studies and Certificate in Teaching in Higher Education as a Future Faculty Fellow at Temple University. Prior to pursuing doctoral studies, Takiyah earned a BA in Dance at the State University of New York at Buffalo and an MFA in Arts Administration at Virginia Tech. Dr. Amin brings experience as a dancer, student affairs administrator, former instructor in both history and Africana studies and demonstrated excellence as a community educator to her work at UNC Charlotte.
Dr. Amin’s scholarly and teaching interests include Black performance and aesthetics, Black feminist thought and activism, 20th century American concert dance and pedagogical concerns in the teaching of global dance traditions. Her scholarship has been published in Dance Chronicle, the Western Journal of Black Studies, the Community Arts Network and the Journal of Pan-African Studies. Takiyah has forthcoming scholarship in Conversations Across the Field of Dance Studies and the Journal for the Anthropological Study of Human Movement. Takiyah's book chapter on the roots of jazz dance, "The African Roots of an American Art Form," is featured in the forthcoming publication, Roots and Branches of Jazz Dance (University of Florida Press, 2013.) Dr. Amin has presented her research nationally and internationally at scholarly conferences including the Association for the Study of African American Life and History (ASALH), The Manning Marable Memorial Conference, Congress on Research in Dance Annual Meeting, Southeastern Women's Studies Association, National Women’s Studies Association Annual Meeting, Society of Dance History Scholars Conference, American College Dance Festival, the American Political Science Association Annual Meeting, the African Heritage Studies Association Annual Conference and the International Colloquium for Vernacular, Hispanic, Historical, American and Folklore Studies in Puebla, Mexico. Takiyah is a former Riley Scholar-in-Residence at Colorado College and past recipient of the Edrie Ferdun Scholarly Achievement Award for excellence in dance studies from the Esther Boyer College of Music and Dance at Temple University.
In service to the dance field, Dr. Amin is a member of the Board of Directors for the Congress on Research in Dance and co-founder (with Dr. Nyama McCarthy Brown) of CORD's Diversity Working Group. Additionally, Takiyah is co-convener (with Dr. Thomas DeFrantz) of the Collegium for African Diaspora Dance (CADD.) Dr. Amin has served as reviewer for both Dance Research Journal and Dance Chronicle and is a contributor to the new Routledge Encyclopedia of Modernism. Takiyah was a participant in the inaugural Mellon Dance in/and the Humanities Summer Seminar at Northwestern University and is currently the host of the Dance Channel on the New Books Network, a consortium of podcasts dedicated to raising the level of public discourse by introducing serious authors to serious audiences. At UNCC, Dr. Amin shared her expertise at the inaugural "Perspectives in Dance Studies" colloquium and serves as Faculty Advisor (with Gretchen Alterowitz) to M.O.V.E. Dance Alliance.
Beyond the academy, Dr. Amin is COO and Administrative Director of Danse4Nia Repertory Ensemble, a Philadelphia-based, multicultural, contemporary modern dance company. Takiyah's community-based memberships include the International Black Doctoral Network Association (IBDNA,) National Coalition of 100 Black Women, National Association of University Women, and Sisters of the Academy (SOTA,) an international organization that promotes collaborative scholarship among Black women in higher education. In her leisure time, Takiyah enjoys traveling, reading contemporary fiction, attending arts and cultural events and pageantry, having earned 9 titles to date.
Dr. Takiyah Nur Amin is a proud native of Buffalo, NY and is the eldest daughter of Karima and the late Abdul Jalil Amin.
Dr. Amin’s scholarly and teaching interests include Black performance and aesthetics, Black feminist thought and activism, 20th century American concert dance and pedagogical concerns in the teaching of global dance traditions. Her scholarship has been published in Dance Chronicle, the Western Journal of Black Studies, the Community Arts Network and the Journal of Pan-African Studies. Takiyah has forthcoming scholarship in Conversations Across the Field of Dance Studies and the Journal for the Anthropological Study of Human Movement. Takiyah's book chapter on the roots of jazz dance, "The African Roots of an American Art Form," is featured in the forthcoming publication, Roots and Branches of Jazz Dance (University of Florida Press, 2013.) Dr. Amin has presented her research nationally and internationally at scholarly conferences including the Association for the Study of African American Life and History (ASALH), The Manning Marable Memorial Conference, Congress on Research in Dance Annual Meeting, Southeastern Women's Studies Association, National Women’s Studies Association Annual Meeting, Society of Dance History Scholars Conference, American College Dance Festival, the American Political Science Association Annual Meeting, the African Heritage Studies Association Annual Conference and the International Colloquium for Vernacular, Hispanic, Historical, American and Folklore Studies in Puebla, Mexico. Takiyah is a former Riley Scholar-in-Residence at Colorado College and past recipient of the Edrie Ferdun Scholarly Achievement Award for excellence in dance studies from the Esther Boyer College of Music and Dance at Temple University.
In service to the dance field, Dr. Amin is a member of the Board of Directors for the Congress on Research in Dance and co-founder (with Dr. Nyama McCarthy Brown) of CORD's Diversity Working Group. Additionally, Takiyah is co-convener (with Dr. Thomas DeFrantz) of the Collegium for African Diaspora Dance (CADD.) Dr. Amin has served as reviewer for both Dance Research Journal and Dance Chronicle and is a contributor to the new Routledge Encyclopedia of Modernism. Takiyah was a participant in the inaugural Mellon Dance in/and the Humanities Summer Seminar at Northwestern University and is currently the host of the Dance Channel on the New Books Network, a consortium of podcasts dedicated to raising the level of public discourse by introducing serious authors to serious audiences. At UNCC, Dr. Amin shared her expertise at the inaugural "Perspectives in Dance Studies" colloquium and serves as Faculty Advisor (with Gretchen Alterowitz) to M.O.V.E. Dance Alliance.
Beyond the academy, Dr. Amin is COO and Administrative Director of Danse4Nia Repertory Ensemble, a Philadelphia-based, multicultural, contemporary modern dance company. Takiyah's community-based memberships include the International Black Doctoral Network Association (IBDNA,) National Coalition of 100 Black Women, National Association of University Women, and Sisters of the Academy (SOTA,) an international organization that promotes collaborative scholarship among Black women in higher education. In her leisure time, Takiyah enjoys traveling, reading contemporary fiction, attending arts and cultural events and pageantry, having earned 9 titles to date.
Dr. Takiyah Nur Amin is a proud native of Buffalo, NY and is the eldest daughter of Karima and the late Abdul Jalil Amin.
