About

Nadra Assaf

Associate Professor of Dance

Dr. Nadra Majeed Assaf is the founder/artistic director of Al-Sarab Dance Foundation which houses Al-Sarab Dance School as well as Al-Sarab Dance Company. She is also a full-time academic at the Lebanese American University and a well-known researcher in dance in the Middle East.

She received her MFA in Dance from Sarah Lawrence College, and a Doctorate of Education from Leicester University. In addition to those degrees she also has a BA in Theater and a BS in Finance. She is best known for her work in dance in the Middle East as she has lived in Lebanon for the past 30+ years.

Most of her dance productions are performed in different countries (Lebanon, Bahrain, USA, Sweden, Finland, and Croatia) include: Public Conflict, Private Scars (2019), Sawtee (2019, 2017), Our Bodies, Our Voices (2017), Am I Who I Am Who Are You Who (2017) Sawtee (2017). This Is How It Happened! (2016), INFLUX (2015), STS: Space-Time-Shape (2012), I Matter: An Audience Interactive Performance (2010), The Faces of EVE (2008-2009), and Majnoun Leila (2007).

In April 2011, she organized and implemented the first annual International Dance Day Festival in Lebanon which continues to exist to date. She is a member of DSA and NDEO and has been a Judge/Instructor on several TV programs concerning performing arts.

Dr. Assaf is an advocate for the arts in Lebanon and the Region. She is also an avid researcher; among her publications: Audience/performer re-action: an investigation into audience/performer reciprocity via a touring site-specific performance in Lebanon (2020) Not Without My Body: The Struggle of Dancers and Choreographers in the Middle East (2015) and “I Matter”: An Interactive Exploration of Audience-Performer Connections (2012).

Books in which she is mentioned: 

  • Women, Dance and Revolution: Performance and Protest in the Southern Mediterranean (2016)
  • Talking Dance: Contemporary Histories from the Southern Mediterranean (2014)