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The start of the 2026-27 year is already filled with so much enthusiasm, as we welcome new faces to the department and celebrate being together again! Creative processes are already underway for our Fall performances, and our classrooms/studios/shops are ready to welcome everyone in for another semester. |
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Check out all of the exciting updates below and
join us for our Open House TODAY from 2:15-3:45pm in Gannett Theater! (Pettigrew Hall, room 103) |
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Emily Culbreath
Assistant Professor of Dance |
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Emily Culbreath, MFA, is a dance maker, educator, writer, performer, and practitioner whose work inhabits the crossroads of street and club dance, choreo-activism, theater, and collective practice. She is best known as a former core member and rehearsal director with Rennie Harris Puremovement, and currently as the co-founder and director of Snack Break Movement Arts, a street dance theater and education collaborative that presents work nationally and internationally, including at the San Francisco International Hip Hop Dance Festival and Summer Dance Forever (Amsterdam).
Her research examines the intersections of critical race theory, gender studies, autoethnography, Hip Hop theater and pedagogy, and collaborative performance, tracing how embodied knowledge flows through identity, power, and collective authorship. Emily has served as a guest artist-in-residence at institutions across the United States and presented work at the American College Dance Association National Festival (Washington, D.C., 2025). She teaches and lectures in academic and community spaces and contributes writing to the dance journalism platform thINKingDANCE (Philadelphia).
Emily is honored and thrilled to join the faculty of the Theater and Dance Department at Bates College in Fall 2026, bringing her practice, research, and vision to a new community of artists and thinkers. |
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Joshua Culbreath
Applied Dance Faculty |
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Joshua Culbreath (BBoy Supa Josh) is a choreographer, educator, and cultural ambassador specializing in Hip Hop and street dance. A Philadelphia native, he began Breaking at age seven and has since become an influential figure in the field. He has performed with Rennie Harris Puremovement from 2009 to 2023, serving as Assistant Artistic Director during his tenure. Joshua is Co-founder of Snack Break Movement Arts, a street-dance-inspired performance duo, and a member of Retro Flow Crew, representing the Philadelphia and New Jersey Breaking scenes. Named one of Dance Magazine’s Top 25 Artists to Watch in 2019, his work has been presented at The Annenberg Center, The Yard, ICA Boston, The Palace of Fine Arts, and internationally in Amsterdam.
In 2012, he was selected as a U.S. Hip Hop cultural ambassador to the DR of Congo under the Obama Administration. He holds an MFA in Dance from the University of Iowa, where his research explored Hip Hop as an embodied archive and a tool for community transformation. |
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Kati Vecsey
Associate Professor of Theater and European Studies |
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Join us in congratulating Kati Vecsey, who has received an exciting new title as Associate Professor of Theater and European Studies!
Kati will be on sabbatical during the Fall 2026 semester, spending two months in her native Hungary to advance her ongoing research on post-communist contemporary theater. Her current focus centers on Hungarian and German playwrights, directors, and independent theater companies, with archival research based at the Hungarian Theatre Museum and Institute and the Goethe Institut.
As a primary outcome of her research, Kati will launch a new course for the European Studies Program cross-listed with Theater: EUS/THEA 267 - European Drama after 1989.
Additionally, during the 2027 Short Term, she and Prof. Jakub Kazecki will co-lead the off-campus course THEA/EUS/GER s33 - Central European Theater and Film, taking students on an immersive study program to Budapest and Berlin. |
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