The ATD Lectorate is delighted to announce that the ATD Teacher-Researcher Fellowship 2024-25 has been awarded to Nita Liem and Bart Deuss for their project “Living Archive: Making dance theater with communities. 20 years of Don’t Hit Mama”.

During their fellowship, Nita and Bart will build on their long-standing practical research - through their company Don’t Hit Mama - into how social dance and hip hop resources can transform dance theatre and the relationship between art and community.

Through an on-going “research studio” hosted at the school, Nita and Bart will involve the ATD and other communities in activating archival materials coming from their 20 years of developing working methods for connecting social dance forms, identity and cultural education - including in the context of intergenerational projects and autoethographic research where personal stories reveal insights about the Dutch colonial past.

The fellowship is particularly developed in collaboration with the Dance in Education (DD) and Theatre in Education programs - where Nita and Bart have taught for many years - but will also enable engagement and connection for students and teachers across departments, exploring how ATD curricula and the learning developed by Don’t Hit Mama can inform each other.

Bart Deuss is a writer, maker, performer and teacher at Dance in Education (DD). Nita Liem is a dance theater maker, performer and teacher at DD and Theatre in Education, and in the past also at SNDO, Mime, JMD, and the 5 o’ clock class. She is also a member of the Embodied Knowledge research group of the ATD Lectorate. Together Nita and Bart were the founders and artistic directors of the dance theater company Don’t Hit Mama (2000-2021). 

Read a interview with Nita Liem here.