The UNESCO Chair on Anthropology of Traditional Music was present at the special award ceremony honoring Dr. Rena (Eirini) Loutzaki on April 4, 2025, at the Ethnomusicology and Cultural Anthropology Laboratory of the Department of Music Studies, Faculty of Philosophy, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (NKUA).

Professor Emeritus Pavlos Kavouras, Chairholder of the UNESCO Chair, delivered a meaningful address recognizing Dr. Loutzaki’s significant contributions to dance studies.

The ceremony featured thoughtful remarks from distinguished speakers including Maria Papapavlou, Lambros Liavas, Zoi Dionyssiou, Zoi Margari, and Christos Papakosta.

Dr. Rena Loutzaki is Associate Professor Emeritus at the Department of Music Studies of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, specializing in dance anthropology. She studied kinetography (Laban system) at the Folkwang Hochschule für Musik, Tanz und Theater with Albrecht Knust. With a scholarship from the Peloponnesian Folklore Foundation, she continued her studies in Northern Ireland at Queen’s University of Belfast, where she completed her postgraduate thesis (1984) and her doctoral dissertation in Dance Anthropology on “Dance as a cultural message: A study of dance style among the refugees from Northern Thrace” (1989).

The event was part of the conference “Dance in the Public Sphere: Studies, Policies, and Pedagogies” (April 3-6, 2025), organized jointly by the Department of Primary Education of the University of Ioannina and the Department of Physical Education & Sport Science of the University of Thessaly. The conference was held under the auspices of the National Committee of the International Council for Traditions of Music and Dance (ICTMD) in collaboration with the Ethnomusicology and Cultural Anthropology Laboratory of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens.

The conference celebrated the 30th anniversary of the School of Education Sciences at the University of Ioannina and was conducted entirely online, bringing together dance scholars and practitioners from around the world. Those interested can access the conference materials at  the conference’s website

The conference honored Dr. Eirini (Rena) Loutzaki for her significant and long-standing contribution to the development of Dance Studies in Greece.

We congratulate Dr. Loutzaki on this well-deserved recognition of her remarkable career and lasting impact on the field of dance studies.