Episode 25: Covid Conversations #2- Dancers and Teachers of Argentine Tango – Jessica Tupa and Monica Maria Fumagalli

This episode of Covid Conversations, a podcast series from the OSU Center of Folklore Studies, features a discussion between two dancers and teachers of Argentine tango about the impact of the pandemic on the performance and teaching of Argentine tango, a dance in which closeness—of dance partners, students, and audiences—is a necessary feature.

Show Notes

Host Rachel Hopkin moderates a conversation between Dayton-based dancer and psychotherapist Jessica Tupa and dancer and scholar Monica Maria Fumagalli of Milan, Italy.

Tupa is a psychotherapist with a background as a dancer and educator. An alumna of the Ohio State University Department of Dance, she started dancing Argentine tango several years ago. Before Covid, she traveled extensively with her partner for tango within the U.S. and Europe. Jessica uses her movement background to support wholistic well-being both in her psychotherapy practice and in her own life. During Covid, Jessica has spent some of her time teaching her Tupaco Tango Barre method online. For more information, visit her website at www.tupaco.com/meet-your-instructor.

Fumagalli studied many forms of dance before taking up Argentine tango in 1990. She has taught and performed the dance internationally, including in the U.S., and established a tango school in her native Milan. Monica is also an accomplished scholar who has published and presented widely on the history and culture of Argentine tango. You can read more about Fumagalli—and watch some of her performances—at www.monicamaria.net.

Covid Conversations is a podcast series from the Center for Folklore Studies at the Ohio State University in which artists and humanities professionals from Ohio and their counterparts elsewhere in the world discuss how their lives and work have been affected by the Coronavirus pandemic.

The series is funded by an OSU Global Arts and Humanities Discovery Theme grant and distributed by Ohio Humanities. It is produced and presented by radio producer and folklorist Rachel Hopkin and mastered by Paul Kotheimer at OSU.

Music for this podcast is provided by Pixabay.

For more about the Center for Folklore Studies, where the full recordings of each episode will be archived along with contextual information about each episode, please visit cfs.osu.edu.

To learn more about Ohio Humanities podcasts and other projects and programs, please visit ohiohumanities.org.

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