Chell Parkins

Chell Parkins is a dance scholar, advocate, educator, choreographer, and performer whose research explores the experiences of Latinx communities engaged in culturally responsive-sustaining dance programs. Her recent documentary, WanderlustDance: Puerto Rico, invites audiences to look at the culture, politics, and people of post-Maria Puerto Rico through interviews set against footage of solo dancing at historical sites across the archipelago. She is a regular guest lecturer in national and international university dance programs and ongoing visiting lecturer for the child and adolescent psychiatry fellows at Oregon Health and Science University. She served as a scholar in residence and consultant to the community engagement director at Ballet Hispánico, has made numerous presentations and webinars at NDEO and DaCI, and served as a panelist for the Shirley Hall Bass Dance Educators Forum to discuss culturally appropriate methods for creating dance standards in the Bahamas. Previously, as the executive director of the Tennessee Association of Dance, a core member of ArtsEd Tennessee, and fine arts subject matter expert for the Tennessee Department of Education, she was a leading voice in statewide dance education advocacy efforts. As a full-time lecturer at Middle Tennessee State University, she helped create and implement the first and only stand-alone dance major in the state and co-directed a Maymester abroad program in the Guatemalan Highlands. From 2012-2015, Parkins directed the dance program at Manor High School, a predominately working-class Latinx high school in rural Texas. Her publication “Dance Media Collaborations: Engaging At-Risk Youth” details how her students used choreographic methods, technology, and social media to explore cultural identity and social issues. As a dancer and choreographer, she has performed across the United States, Northern Ireland and Spain.