...and the belief that the earth  a dancer dances  upon is sacred. In other words, meaningful, purposeful, relevant, and serious. For it is a human being that moves  in space-time  writing her or  his Holy Scripture of their humanity in the wind.  Visible and invisible, material yet imponderable. Dance is life, pro life and through life. Dance is culture and art. It offers a path of self-knowledge and self-revelation. Dance is indeed the  Musica Humana  that may connect us with the rhythm of the Universe. There are many kinds of dancing that can be done and performed; ethnic or folk  dance, ballroom dancing,  classical ballet,  sacred dance, ritual dance, free dance, personal dance  & many others. A solo,  a pair or a community one.  All of them posit wholeness of a person and champion ontological none dualism suggesting being in tune with Nature for life, both bίos and zoé,   is one and unique. Life is worth being danced, that is  to say being  understood, danced out, developed and praised. Such seems to be a message to be inferred from the Hindu concept of the Shiva’s  creative and cosmic dance.

            Polish  Society of Anthropology of Dance, PSAD,  tries to implement the ideas stated above in variety of ways in an unremitting effort to bridge art with science and academy.  The organisation  was launched in Krakow, Poland,  in  2003 by an artist scholar Wiesna Mond  with the first edition of the International Festival of Anthropology of Dance, IFAD.  Dr Mond  holds a  post diploma in dance studies and choreography issued by then Rudolf Laban Institute for Dance and Movement in London, today  Trinity Laban.  It was a result of her liaison with  Jagiellonian University/ Department of Theatre, Manggha Museum of Japanese Art and Solvay-Centre of Contemporary Art.  The Organisation was officially registered in 2007  through administrative cooperation with Institute of Sociology, Jagiellonian University, which contributed logistically in launching the second edition of the IFAD in 2003: Rhythms and Steps of Africa.  PSAD  holds a  legal status  of non - profit, non- governmental orgnisation promoting  a phenomenon of dance as an act  of art, culture and/social integrity.  Yet first of all as a subject matter of academic research. With time PSAD widened its research horizons by addressing the field works of correspondence of arts, multimodal arts,  nature of aesthetic experience and therapy through arts from comparative approach and vantage point. Versatility of its projects and activities is adequately illustrated  by the structure of  its sub-institution which is  International Festival of Anthropology of Dance, IFAD; each festival day starts with academic conference in the morning, early afternoon is dedicated to movement workshops and finally it gets completed with  a  dance performance or an art exhibition in the evening. This done with the object of mutual exchange  between theory and practice in the field of performing arts.

The main activities of PSAD, which has been active locally and overseas since 2003 on,  covers thematic lectures, workshops, performances, research projects, dance related publications and releases.