Arts Unplugged: Fancy Dance

Two women stand with their arms crossed inside a brightly lit store. Shelves of merchandise line the background as both look forward with serious expressions.

The College of Arts & Sciences will present two free films at Cornell Cinema on Thursday, November 5, as part of a three-day event: "Language, memory, future: Celebrating 250 years of language in our region.”

Screenings will take place at 4:30pm and 7:30pm. The program will feature:

Deaf President Now! (2025, dir. Nyle DiMarco & Davis Guggenheim), the story of the 1988 student protest at Gallaudet University that led to the appointment of the university’s first Deaf president, with a talk by Greg Hlibok, one of the student leaders featured in the film, at 4:30 p.m., followed by,
Fancy Dance (2023, dir. Erica Tremblay) at 7:30 p.m.

Fancy Dance is a powerful coming-of-age story that offers nuanced account of the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women epidemic. Since her sister’s disappearance, Jax (Lily Gladstone) has cared for her niece Roki (Isabel Deroy-Olson) by scraping by on the Seneca-Cayuga Reservation in Oklahoma. At the risk of losing custody to Jax’s father, Frank (Shea Whigham), the pair hit the road and scour the backcountry to track down Roki’s mother in time for the powwow. What begins as a search gradually turns into a far deeper investigation into the complexities and contradictions of Indigenous women moving through a colonized world and at the mercy of a failed justice system.

Free and open to all! Sponsored by College of Arts & Sciences’ Arts Unplugged series.

The Arts Unplugged event will also include a Nov. 6 keynote address by Daniel Kaufman, director of the Endangered Language Alliance and associate professor at Queens College, and an evening of performances at the Schwartz Center for the Performing Arts, as well as an academic conference Nov. 7

The College of Arts & Sciences’ Arts Unplugged series brings research and creative works into the public sphere for discussion and inspiration. These engaging events invite a broad audience to explore the work of scholars, faculty and creative luminaries across disciplines in arts and sciences to celebrate the impact that work continues to have on humanity.

In English and Gayogo̱hó:nǫˀ with English subtiltes. Part of our "Campus Collaborations" series. Courtesy of Apple TV+.