舞蹈研究博士学位的重点是将舞蹈作为其核心，其研究基础是人类丰富的活动核心。该计划的目的是培养能够展示出严谨的纪律，敏锐的知识和对自己领域发展的深刻认识的学者。舞蹈专业的奖学金（例如，结合运动分析，构成研究和历史方法论）构成了该系研究视角的核心，因此重点在于学生在理论上的读写能力，舞蹈的历史和文学，这些课程通过一系列必修的核心课程来反映这一观点。完成核心课程后，博士生在教职人员的密切指导下构思了一个研究主题。受益于领先研究型大学内系的状况，学生可以选择通过较大型大学中任何可用领域的额外学科研究来补充这项独立
The focus of the PhD in Dance Studies keeps dance at its core with research grounded in and emanating from this rich nucleus of human activity. The aim of the program is to produce scholars who can demonstrate disciplinary rigor, intellectual acumen and a profound awareness of developments in their field. Dance-specific scholarship (incorporating, for instance, the analysis of movement, compositional studies and historical methodologies) forms the heart of the department's research perspective, and emphasis is thus placed on the student's attainment of literacy in the theory, history and literature of dance through a cluster of required core courses that reflect this perspective. After completing core courses, the PhD student conceives a research topic with the close advisement of faculty members. Benefiting from the department's situation within a leading research university, the student may choose to supplement this independent research through extra-disciplinary studies in any number of fields available in the larger university. The PhD student's research culminates in a written dissertation.