Relay essay: The Dancing Historian: Naoko Yuge, Assistant Professor, School of Law

This photo was taken seven years ago in Germany. With friends of the ballet club (The right end is me.)

When I was a student, I went dancing five days a week. The place I was dancing was not on the "Otachi-Dai" (the stage) at discos, which were popular in Japan then, but at gloomy dancing rooms in a gym at the university or at the classrooms in a ballet school that was characterized by very strict discipline. I had taken ballet lessons while I was in Germany to study. The tuition fee there was incredibly cheaper than in Japan. I made many friends there, for example a student who had come from the former East Germany and was studying dentistry or an Italian student who had been born in Germany. I was impressed with the ballet teacher, who taught us until just before she had a baby. Then, after I came back to Japan, I sometimes stopped ballet lessons because I was writing papers, but at the moment I am managing to continue with my lessons. At one time I was proud to think that I might be the only ‘dancing historian’ in Japan, but now I do not think so because I have seen that many professors, such as those who wrote previous columns in this series, have various talents. Now I should not regard myself as a dancing historian but as a hardworking historian .

Some of my friends say "Considering that you take ballet lessons, you have pretty poor posture", but ballet is very useful for me, for stress reduction, for a change of pace, and for my health in general. I am convinced that ballet revitalizes my brain. You may think that I exaggerate, but ballet requires different brain functions from those I use when I teach at the university, for instance memorizing choreography and applying it to dance.

I take lessons as a hobby. My ballet teacher, however, shows no mercy, so I am sometimes left behind. Some days ago I made a mistake in my hand movements. Usually my teacher gives advice softly, but on that day she glared at me hatefully and shouted. I did not know why. I lowered my head and waited for her to stop shouting. I had not been scolded for a long time. Now I recognize that professors sometimes scold students, but we are not scolded so often, and I so I will go to take my lesson this week again.