This isn’t meant to be a “Mount Rushmore” list, but these dances all addressed fundamental questions about the meaning(s) of America. They spoke urgently to the times in which they were choreographed or performed. Whether famous or less familiar, as works of art, they haunt us and challenge us and refuse to be forgotten.

Dance of Freedom (1914), Florence Noyes

Florence Noyes created the “Dance of Freedom” early in the 20th century when American women were fighting for the right to vote. Noyes believed in the power of movement to express deep values like liberty, justice, and equality. Drawing on ancient Greek aesthetics and ideals, she choreographed dances that featured billowing sheer scarves and robes, open-arm gestures, and strong upright postures to symbolize dignity and moral clarity. These performances were often seen at women’s suffrage rallies and patriotic events to represent feminine strength at a time when women were still denied full participation in democracy. For more on Noyes, see the fantastic work of Meg Brooker at Duncan Dance South:

     Dancing for Suffrage: Reconstructing Florence Fleming Noyes’s  Dance of Freedom

Source: Meg Brooker, Duncan Dance South, https://www.duncandancesouth.org/dance-of-freedom-project

Within the Quota (1923), Cole Porter

Within the Quota was a jazz ballet created in Paris by American expatriates Cole Porter (music) and Gerald Murphy (scenario and production). It was a satirical response to the restrictive U.S. immigration laws of the 1920s, especially the 1921 Emergency Quota Act. The ballet follows a European immigrant’s comic and chaotic journey through American life, poking fun at the country’s obsession with success, money, and celebrity. Choreographed in a fast-paced, vaudeville style, the dance blended ballet technique with jazz-age flair. Although it was not widely revived, Within the Quota was one of the first ballets to use modern American themes and marked an early example of dance as political commentary. A recent performance of the ballet by dancers at Princeton has brought renewed attention to a Porter work unlike any other.

For more background, see:

The Operatic Saxophone, Discover Cole Porter’s forgotten ballet, “Within the Quota”

Princeton reimagines Cole Porter’s immigration-focused ballet ‘for everyone’

Simanaitis Says, WITHIN THE QUOTA—A 1923 BALLET FOR OUR TIMES

Dennis Simanaitis, "WITHIN THE QUOTA—A 1923 BALLET FOR OUR TIMES PART 2," Simanaitis Says (blog), Retrieved August 2, 2025, https://simanaitissays.com/2020/07/30/within-the-quota/.

Appalachian Spring (1944), Martha Graham

Appalachian Spring is one of Martha Graham’s most iconic modern dance works. Set to a score by Aaron Copland, the piece depicts a young pioneer couple beginning a new life in rural America. Premiering in 1944, during the final years of World War II, the work celebrated American resilience, simplicity, and hope. Graham’s sharp, grounded, and emotionally intense movement style expressed both the struggles and aspirations of ordinary people. The choreography uses clear geometric shapes and powerful stillness to reflect the moral seriousness of American frontier life. The dance became a symbol of American identity at mid-century: independent, idealistic, and deeply tied to the land.

“Martha Graham and ensemble in Appalachian spring.” Source: Library of Congress: https://www.loc.gov/item/2023860905/.

Fancy Free (1944), Jerome Robbins

Choreographed by Jerome Robbins with music by Leonard Bernstein, Fancy Free premiered during World War II and tells the story of three off-duty sailors looking for fun in New York City. Mixing ballet, jazz, and popular dance styles, the choreography is playful, athletic, and flirtatious. It was a hit with audiences and became the basis for the musical On the Town. Fancy Free helped bring working-class themes and American slang movement into ballet, signaling a shift toward a more accessible, homegrown American dance theater.

For more on this highly influential work, see:

Fancy Free, A Classic at Jacob’s Pillow

Jerome Robbins Dance Division, The New York Public Library. "Harold Lang, John Kriza, and Jerome Robbins in Fancy Free, no. 28" New York Public Library Digital Collections. Accessed August 2, 2025. https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/items/ef311880-09f0-0136-7002-059a9e75aa7e

Strange Fruit (1945), Pearl Primus

Strange Fruit was a solo choreographed and performed by Pearl Primus, set to the haunting anti-lynching song made famous by Billie Holiday. Performed barefoot with stark, raw movement, Primus portrayed the shock and grief of witnessing a lynching. Premiering just after World War II, Strange Fruit was one of the first modern dances to confront racial violence directly. Primus’s background in both African and modern dance traditions informed her powerful, grounded movement. The piece is only a few minutes long, but it has forceful impact that is lasting. It showed how dance could speak out against injustice and became a landmark in political performance art.

Jerome Robbins Dance Division, The New York Public Library. "Pearl Primus dancing, likely at Cafe Society Downtown" New York Public Library Digital Collections.

Revelations (1960), Alvin Ailey

Revelations is Alvin Ailey’s signature work and a defining piece in American dance history. Drawing from Ailey’s childhood memories of growing up Black in the segregated South, the piece uses spirituals, gospel, and blues music to explore sorrow, resilience, and joy. Ailey blended modern dance with African American cultural forms and ballet technique to create a new kind of American expression. The choreography ranges from the sorrowful "I Been 'Buked" to the jubilant finale, "Rocka My Soul in the Bosom of Abraham." Revelations is celebrated for its emotional power and universal themes, and it continues to be performed around the world as a tribute to Ailey and the Black American experience he fought to represent.

Above: Dancers Glend Allen Sims (back) and Linda Celeste Sims perform during the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater’s Revelations at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion in Los Angeles on Wednesday, April 17, 2013. Source: IMAGO / ZUMA Press Wire.

Last Supper at Uncle Tom’s Cabin / The Promised Land (1990), Bill T. Jones

This bold work by Bill T. Jones mixes movement, text, historical narrative, and visual imagery. It challenges American myth-making on topics ranging from race and religion to history and sexuality. Drawing on Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin, Christian iconography, and Jones’s own identity as a gay Black man, the dance unites personal testimony with collective memory. The movement style is eclectic and designed to provoke and unsettle. Premiering during the AIDS crisis and culture wars, this work insisted that American ideals be measured against historical and ongoing injustice. It remains a challenging, fiercely political statement about who is included in “the promised land.”

Source: New York Live Arts, Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Company. Photographer: Jeff Day. https://newyorklivearts.org/event/last-supper-at-uncle-toms-cabin-the-promised-land/

Into Sunlight (2011), Robin Becker

Into Sunlight is a contemporary dance work choreographed by Robin Becker and inspired by the book They Marched Into Sunlight by David Maraniss. The piece parallels two events in October 1967: a deadly Vietnam War battle and a student protest at the University of Wisconsin. Danced by two groups, one of soldiers and one of civilians, the choreography contrasts chaos and control, power and vulnerability. Becker’s movement vocabulary blends modern dance with ensemble formations that evoke both connection and fragmentation. Into Sunlight asks how war and activism shape memory and identity. It is a brilliant meditation on conflict and the human capacity for empathy and change.

Source: Robin Becker Dance, https://www.robinbeckerdance.org/into-sunlight

Untitled America (2015), Kyle Abraham

Kyle Abraham’s Untitled America is a modern dance triptych exploring the impact of mass incarceration on Black families. Set to music by artists such as Laura Mvula and to traditional spirituals, the work uses fluid, hip-hop–infused modern dance to convey grief, memory, and loss. Dancers move with a sense of both resistance and vulnerability that is exhibited by reaching, collapsing, and isolation. Abraham interviewed formerly incarcerated individuals and their families, and their words informed the emotional tone of the piece. Untitled America exposes the quiet devastation of imprisonment and asks what freedom really means in modern America.

“Jamar Roberts performs during Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater's rehearsal of "Completed Untitled America" at New York City Center on December 07, 2016 in New York City.” Source: Getty Images. Credit: Donna Ward.

The Missing Generation (2015), Sean Dorsey

The Missing Generation is a ground-breaking work by transgender choreographer Sean Dorsey. Based on interviews with survivors of the early AIDS crisis, the piece honors those lost to AIDS and those who lived through the epidemic. It combines storytelling, gesture, and modern dance to reflect trauma, love, resilience, and intergenerational memory. Dorsey’s choreography is intimate and grounded, often focusing on tenderness, physical support, and stillness. The piece centers queer and trans voices, making space for grief and community healing. The Missing Generation is both an elegy and an act of witness, reclaiming histories too often ignored.

10 Notable American Dances