Critical Engagement

Critical Engagement in Dance & Performing Arts (AQA A-Level) requires students to analyse, interpret, and evaluate professional dance works, choreographic processes, and performance practices. This component develops your ability to articulate informed personal responses, using subject-specific terminology and contextual understanding. You will study six compulsory set works from the AQA specification, including works by choreographers such as Christopher Bruce, Akram Khan, and Martha Graham, exploring their artistic intentions, cultural contexts, and the ways they communicate meaning to audiences.

This topic is central to the A-Level because it bridges practical performance and theoretical understanding. By critically engaging with professional repertoire, you learn to deconstruct choreographic devices, movement styles, and production elements, and to justify your own creative choices. Critical Engagement also prepares you for higher education and careers in the arts, where analytical thinking and articulate communication are essential. It accounts for 50% of the A-Level qualification (Component 2: Critical Engagement), assessed through a written examination.

To succeed, you must move beyond simple description and develop a sophisticated analytical vocabulary. You need to consider how choreographers manipulate space, time, dynamics, and relationships to create impact, and how social, political, and historical contexts shape dance works. Regular viewing of professional recordings, annotation of your own practical work, and practice in structuring comparative essays are key strategies for mastering this topic.