Thank you for being here. Please read this page before you start. It has a few rules that make sure your answers can be counted.
Who is asking I’m Anita Nijhuis, a former professional dancer, teacher, coach and dance educator with more than 25 years in dance. For years I’ve heard the same stories from students, friends and dancers across styles and countries, and words alone haven’t brought enough change. This is my independent, non-commercial research project, shared through Rising Dancers Movement. Nothing is sold, and no school, festival or organisation is behind it.
Why I’m asking you If you’ve shared your story before and are doing it again: thank you. If this is your first time: thank you too. Going back to these experiences takes courage, and I’m deeply grateful. Together, your answers become numbers that, I believe, can’t be ignored. Your answers matter even if nothing bad has ever happened to you: that is important data too.
What it covers Questions about you and your dancing (including questions on gender, sexual orientation and disability); unwanted contact, harassment, sexual coercion and sexual assault, and intimate images taken or shared without consent, including experiences before the age of 18; abuse of power, emotional abuse and control, and financial and physical abuse; discrimination, ticketing and gender-named classes; whether you told anyone, what happened next and how it affected you; injuries, teaching, consent and how safe you feel; questions for people who work in dance; and your views on what should change. At the end, you can share your own ideas.
Before you start
Anonymous. No name or email. Nothing can be traced back to you. Your IP address is not stored with your answers.
Voluntary. Apart from three short questions at the start (your age, where you dance, and your consent) and a few questions that let you choose whether to answer or skip a section, you don’t have to answer anything. If you’d rather not answer a question, please choose “I prefer not to say” where it’s offered (it helps the results), or leave it blank. You can stop any time. Your answers are kept in this browser until you submit, so you can close the page and continue later on the same device; nothing reaches me until you press Submit. On a shared device, please finish in one go.
Sensitive sections have a warning and a skip option.
Adults only (18+), living or dancing in Europe.
Please don’t name anyone, and no events, schools or organisations either. Names will be deleted. This is about patterns, not individuals.
What happens with your answers Overall numbers are shared openly with the dance community and submitted to public authorities at national and European level. Anything you write in your own words may be quoted anonymously in reports to public authorities and in research publications, never on social media. Data is handled under EU data protection rules (GDPR). Your answers are processed on the basis of your consent (GDPR Article 6(1)(a)), and for sensitive information, your explicit consent (Article 9(2)(a)), which you give in Q0.3. Because the answers are anonymous, individual responses cannot be identified, changed or deleted after submission.
Questions? Write to contact@rising-dancers.com or DM on Instagram rising.dancers.movement account. For your experience to be counted in the research and stay anonymous, please share it here in the survey. If you’d also like to talk to me personally, you’re welcome to reach out; just know that messages aren’t anonymous and can’t be included in the results.
