Shivani Joshi

🪔 About

Shivani Joshi is an Indian classical dancer, educator, and researcher specializing in Bharatanatyam and Indian folk dance styles. She has been trained in Bharatanatyam for over 20 years and completed her Arangetram with Avni Vyas at Shivanjali Dance Academy. Shivani holds a Master of Arts in Performance Studies from NYU Tisch School of the Arts, graduating in 2021. Her master's dissertation explored communities of women creating cultural spaces, the impact of colonialism in India, and its effects on Bharatanatyam. She also conducted research on the Devadasi community, with her thesis on psychological agency winning the Originality Prize in Memory of Paul Jeffrey Kusyszyn at York University, where she earned Bachelor of Science degrees in Kinesiology and Psychology. Joshi advocates for the significance of folk arts, such as Garba, and teaches various Indian folk dances and prop work. She is an arts educator and guest speaker, conducting workshops on Indian heritage, women's spaces, dance, and diversity. Shivani is a Professor at Centennial College, teaching Contemporary Performance Analysis, and serves as the Writer-In-Residence at Nova Dance. Her artistic practice involves combining props and narrative to explore modern stories and utilizing visual metaphor in physical form. She performs Bharatanatyam and Indian folk dance styles throughout Ontario for various dance academies and South-Asian dance companies. She also holds the position of General Manager at Dusk Dances and contributed as a writer to the Nova Dance book, 'We will remember this'. Awards & Honours: Originality Prize in Memory of Paul Jeffrey Kusyszyn.