When I was asked to organize a panel for the 2001 Congress on Research in Dance (CORD) conference in honor of my friend and colleague Deborah Jowitt, I thought of calling it “Life After Dance.” I was thinking about how research and writing can be a way for dancers to go on living in their profession when they're no longer actively dancing, as Deborah Jowitt has done. But I also see the products of dance research as giving life back to the profession. I wanted the session to approach research from different points of view. The four presenters I invited here are all friends of Deborah Jowitt; all of them are writers and teachers. Their papers revealed four very different personalities, actively engaged in interpreting dance as a presence in our lives.