Dr Erica Rose Jeffrey believes in the power of movement connected to positive social change. A ‘dance activist’ she seeks to create positive ways of seeing, participating and collaborating in, around, and through dance. Involved in multiple communities, she has worked internationally as a peacebuilder, facilitator, performer, educator, and arts leader. Originally from Montana, she is currently a Director of Peace and Conflict Studies Institute Australia (PaCSIA) in Brisbane, Australia. The first dancer to be selected as a Rotary World Peace Fellow, in addition to established peacebuilding approaches, she investigates the connections of dance, empathy and peace. Her research has included work in the Philippines specifically in Mindanao, Fiji, Bougainville (Papua New Guinea) and the United States. Erica Rose holds a PhD in Creative Industries focusing on Dance and Peacebuilding from Queensland University of Technology, a M.A. in International Relations-Peace and Conflict Studies from the University of Queensland, and B.S. degrees in Dance and Mediation and Conflict Resolution from Indiana University as a Wells Scholar. She is an experienced facilitator, educator and researcher working in diverse cultural contexts. As a Director of PaCSIA, she is currently engaged in community level peacebuilding projects in Australia and internationally including Vanuatu, the Solomon Islands, and Papua New Guinea. Dr Jeffrey is deeply involved in PaCSIA’s work in the Autonomous Region of Bougainville in Papua New Guinea which has supported the internationally recognised referendum on Bougainville’s future political status of 2019, and which has reached over 45,000 Bougainvilleans through the use of facilitated public dialogue.
www.pacsia.com.au
Dr Jeffrey is also the Director for Dance for Parkinson’s Australia and through working with the Mark Morris dance Group Dance for PD® program, was instrumental in starting Dance for Parkinson’s Australia, launching classes nationwide, and supporting development of programs in the Asia and Pacific regions.
www.dancepdau.org