The American Dance Festival is perhaps the largest and the most influential dance festival in the world today. The festival consists of a four-week dance school and a six-week modern dance festival that is held at Duke University and at the Durham Performing Arts Center in North Carolina. It was first known as the Bennington Festival, which began in 1934. The Bennington Festival was a summer dance program of Bennington College. It was at this program that Hanya Holm, Doris Humphrey, Martha Graham, and Charles Weidman, all known as pioneers of modern dance, came and taught modern dance techniques together.

Fourteen years later, the American Dance Festival, which was modeled on the Bennington Festival was organized. Today, a number of dances have been featured at the American Dance Festival, many of which were commissioned by the ADF itself.