Paper short abstract:

What asymmetries of power determine/undermine ownership and rights to embodied knowledge in the global flow of ideas? Ethnographic examples include folklorisation of West African village dances serving nationalism, and Japanese/Chinese elements in Robert Wood's Contemporary Dance choreography.

Paper long abstract:

This paper explores conditions under which danced knowledge circulates between cultural contexts. It asks, when does cultural borrowing become appropriation? What are the politics of "authenticity" involved? When is it a factor, and to whom does it matter? And what asymmetries of power are at work that determine or undermine ownership and rights to embodied knowledge in the global flow of ideas? Ethnographic examples are drawn from the imposition of Western "folklorization" strategies onto Ghanaian and Senegalese village dances for consumption on the international stage, and the import of Japanese and Chinese cultural elements into a contemporary choreographic work by New York choreographer Robert Wood, commissioned by the Florence Dance Company, Italy.

Paper short abstract:

This paper looks at multicultural aspects of the Indian dance form Odissi from the point of view of individual contributions to a reality - including the researcher's. Practised by a variety of people in different places, negotiations on 'preserving its tradition' generate specific tension fields.

Paper long abstract:

The dance form Odissi, projected as cultural heritage from the Indian state Orissa, is in its definition itself bound to a specific territory. Yet since what has been called its "revival" in the context of post-Independence India, dancers, dance teachers & choreographers have been spreading this form in diverse urban centres, amongst different sections of society, multiplying changes according to the diverse environments they evolved in. Certain factors, for example the dancer's/ choreographer's eagerness to perform 'abroad', and the increasing presence of white, yellow & other 'other' learners of the dance, suggest that 'the West' is important to the Odissi world.

Despite the diversity of actors, issues emerge around the concept of 'preserving tradition'. Independently from individual aspirations or activities, specific aspects of a person's identity open certain avenues rather than others, & contribute to this tension field.

By examining encountered situations, this paper proposes to question the individual's contribution to this reality through the particularity of the researcher's position, looking at her as a person acting on & being acted upon by 'the community'. How is the process of knowledge production influenced by her integration into the group, & diverse aspects of her multifaceted identity?

Paper short abstract:

The Japanese are renowned masters of imitation including of Spanish flamenco. Instead of partaking in discussions on essence and authenticity, I propose to look at style as a difference of method, instruction and appropriation, from a sensorial perspective, to understand Japanese flamenco.

Paper long abstract:

Based on ethnographic research in Sevilla, Andalusia, this paper presents an exploration of the methodological differences in learning flamenco dance between Spanish flamenco students and teachers, and Japanese students; and some mutual misunderstanding based on these differences.

With a shared history of more than three decades, about 650 flamenco schools in Japan today, and an estimated 80.000 Japanese aficionados, a 'Japanese flamenco' (furamenko) has emerged. Critics and performers, Spanish and Japanese, acknowledge the Japanese variation as a distinct style. WHAT turns a style different is too often imbedded in moral discussions; particular within the flamenco discourse of 'rootedness', jondo, and puro. Instead, I argue that style is a performative competence, a practical kind of knowledge focusing on HOW. Only by taking style as its method, and not as its commonsensical opposition to content, the 'what' (and 'why') of Japanese flamenco can be understood. This approach avoids the ongoing (un)ethical-aesthetical discussions that miss flamenco's global development as a 'world music', an understanding of its universal appeal, and its local 'appropriations'.

In investigating the employed methods of both instruction and acquirement, (an anthropology of) the senses show to be at the heart of aesthetic valuations and of dominant learning systems in Spain and Japan.

Paper short abstract:

My paper examines the place of dance in defining religious identity in UK Tamil temples. It questions if changes in temple ritual practices and accompanying dance forms indicate an expressive culture reaffirming faith, or whether a growing Hindu scriptualism and religious nationalism are revealed.

Paper long abstract:

In UK Tamil temples, the increasing religiosity and sacrility of temple ritual alongside a growth of Bharatanatyam dance performance presents a new discourse of performed Tamil Hinduism. Are these spectacles of specific 'faith' confirming a uniquely Tamil identity, or are such contemporary practices an ironic reversal to the times of the devadasis (original temple dancers)? What perceptions of the dance are held by devotees, priests, performers? What are the political implications of these resurgent religious sensibilities and do they support a 'globalized localism' (Waghorne 2004), where local, once-rural practices are being exported throughout the Tamil diaspora?

This paper, using evidence from ethnographic work in London Tamil temples and local Tamil communities, seeks to answer these questions in order to gain an understanding of the place of dance in defining religious identity. It too interrogates whether changes in temple and ritual practices and their accompanying dance forms are aspects of expressive culture that reaffirm, or 'perform' faith, or whether they are being expressed in relation to a growing Hindu scriptualism and a dominant religious nationalism.

Waghorne, J. P. (2004). Diaspora of the Gods. Modern Hindu Temples in an Urban Middle-Class World. Oxford and New York, OUP.

Paper short abstract:

This paper will discuss the practice and understanding of Middle Eastern dance in Sweden in relation to the unsettling or reinforcing of established understandings of the feminine, the masculine, the Swedish and the foreign.

Paper long abstract:

This paper will focus the Oriental and Egyptian dance in Stockholm in relation to the unsettling or reinforcing of established understandings of the feminine, the masculine, the Swedish and the foreign.

Oriental dance (Middle Eastern Dance) is becoming increasingly popular all over the World, not least in Europe. I will discuss the practice and understanding of oriental dance in Sweden using ethnographic examples from two different schools of oriental dance in Stockholm. A majority of the dancers are of Swedish descent, and many of well educated middle class.

Choreographical creativity and the ability or ambition to accommodate diverse cultural elements will be related to the dancers' understanding of authenticity and their relationship to the Oriental "Other". I will also discuss the oriental dance in relation to the wider social context of contemporary Stockholm, and the search for a new female embodied subjectivity that motivates many of the Swedish performers of oriental dance.

The school labelling itself Oriental Dance is similar to traditional "belly dance", and looks to modern Middle East for inspiration. The Swedish dancers strive to use movements and attributes that would be recognized in Cairo or Beirut. The performers of the Egyptian Dance have, on the other hand, transformed not only the movements of the traditional oriental dance, but also the dancer's expression, attitude, costume and attributes. Most important to these dancers is not trying to make a performance similar to dance in contemporary or historical Egypt, but the dancer's ability to express the music and herself as an individual. In experimental performances the "Egyptian" dancers of Stockholm create hybrid forms that combine elements of dance, music and attributes in new ways. The "Oriental" dancers of Stockholm, by contrast, typically use established choreographical forms for oriental dancing.

Paper short abstract:

An ethnography of an Israeli night club, where only Israeli Yemenite music and dances are performed, will help us to understand how the Israeli cultural framework is constantly under redefinition as the articulation between a European cultural model, diasporic specificities and Zionist ideology.

Paper long abstract:

Every Saturday night, when Shabbat is over and everyday life is about to resume again in Israel, the night club Mecholot Teiman ("Dances of Yemen") opens its doors in Tel Aviv. From 100 to 200 young Israelis are arriving little by little, and the dance floor starts to fill up.

While almost any international observer would agree to describe the place as a night club, it would be probably more difficult for him to recognize the dance style: it isn't any kind of rock, neither techno, hip hop, jazz or salsa.

"It is Yemenite dance of course!" would answer almost any Israeli.

"Maybe, but definitely not what I use to do in Yemen" would reply an old Yemenite Jew who did dance in Yemen before arriving in Israel at the beginning of the 1950s.

Indeed, the two pieces of dance which may mainly be observed during the night at Mecholot Teiman are the result of a dynamic contact between a Jewish Yemenite specificity and an Israeli historical and political redefinition of cultural practices based on Zionism ideology and European standards.

But what is reshaping what ? Is Mecholot Teiman simply an international model of night club (late opening, general darkness with colorful spotlights, alcoholic drinks and loud music, large dancing floor and small tables) where "international dances" are replaced by Yemenite dances? Or does the Israeli-Yemenite specificity of dancers and singers involved have an influence on this setting? Does the international setting of night club influence in turn the Yemenite dances performed there?

An ethnography of the context, along with formal analysis of the dance itself, will help us understand the process of this reciprocal influence, and the constant articulation between local and global which dominates the Israeli cultural framework.

Paper short abstract:

Through the detailed examination of the staging of a 1980 state dance festival, I will analyse how Eurocentric conceptions of correct dance performance were used to relay/construct normative conceptions of time, space and the body in postcolonial nation-building Nigeria.

Paper long abstract:

In 1980, during my first year in Nigeria, I was invited to participate in the Bendel State Festival of Arts and Culture as 'Chief Judge of Maiden Dance'. Organised by the Bendel State Arts Council, this festival brought to the state capital, Benin-City, during one week over the Christmas holidays, nearly one hundred dance groups from the state's nineteen Local Government Areas, each group performing in one of five categories of dance (ritual, ceremonial, masquerade, maiden and acrobatic). Using ethnographic material constituted during this event and other related sources from the 1980s, I shall examine how eurocentric conceptions of dance structure, staging and performance permeated all stages of the festival from group training and selection to the marking of presentations and the awarding of prizes, and how these were relayed by personnel of the Arts Council, an institution itself modelled upon its British counterpart.

Paper short abstract:

This paper examines dancing as a socio-historical process through which East Asian countries formulated projects of cultural renovation under a local version of gradually globalised ideologies and world view. It focuses on Shinbuyo, Japanese 'New Dance', which emerged in the early 20th century.

Paper long abstract:

This paper intends to delineate the intermediating dimension between Europe and Asia that dancing has created during the last few centuries in the island chains of East Asia, including Japan, Okinawa and Taiwan. Started from a dramatic record of an encounter between the British Captain Basil and the Okinawan people in the colonial epoch, the paper mainly investigates dancing as the social and historical process through which East Asia countries formulated projects of cultural renovation under a local version of gradually globalized ideologies and world view. The analysis is focused on the created genre of Shinbuyo, which means 'New Dance' in Japanese, for its connection with the Europe-based dance movement and schools, such as the Danza Nouveau and Dalcroze's Eurythmics. The artistic category of Shinbuyo and its development highlights that the input of new body techniques as cultural forms has been implied with the original and shared humanity, and hence allowed different cultural bearers to create, beyond language barriers, exchange with each other under certain social and historical context in the first half of the twentieth century.

Paper short abstract:

For Senegalese performers, Europe is a source of both artistic envy and contempt. Meanwhile, European choreographers increasingly look towards Africa for inspiration. This paper explores the sociological dimensions at stake in the interaction between the European and the West African dance scenes.

Paper long abstract:

In the Dakarois dance world, comments referring to the use of local dances as a source of inspiration in European contemporary dance are commonplace. Senegalese dance people routinely discuss their interaction with the European scene in terms of their creativity being 'exploited', performers being pushed into 'indecency' for the satisfaction of White audiences, or so-called 'African dance' being sought after as a potentially profitable 'market'. But people also display an ambivalent attitude towards a European dance scene which is simultaneously envied for its perceived wealth and despised for the lack of 'urgency' of its creations. Meanwhile, an increasing number of European choreographers acknowledge Africa as a source of inspiration, where fruitful collaborations can be established with artists trained in different bodily techniques. Yet the received wisdom is that the choreographic experiments that have taken place on the continent over the past three decades are a simplified copy of European choreographic forms. How are we, then, to make sense of this contradiction?

Drawing on extensive fieldwork in Dakar as well as on historical data, in this paper I argue that both worlds have long developed in interplay with each other. The paper also seeks to go beyond creative issues and ask what socio-economic factors lay behind the increasing to-and-fro movement of performers between Europe and Africa. From a Senegalese perspective, I suggest that choreographic encounters have become a highly valued route towards international careers and migration. But from a European perspective, the renewed interest in African performance is also entangled in economic issues. In France for example, the gradual withdrawal of state subsidies for dance companies has made it necessary to find new sources of funding, and therefore new ways of framing choreographic work. In a European context in which migration has become a sensitive political issue, it is tempting to re-frame the performing arts in terms of 'cross-cultural exchange'.

In short, this paper seeks to explore some of the artistic and sociological dimensions at stake in the long-standing interaction between European and African performers, choreographers, audiences and state institutions.

Paper short abstract:

Uduk music and dance (Sudan-Ethiopia borderlands)have proved robust in the face of European colonialism and also displacement as a result of war. Various new 'external' styles have been adopted, but kept separate from 'traditional' forms (once banned by missionaries).

Paper long abstract:

<b>Co-author: Judith Aston, University of the West of England</b><br>

Short abstract:

This presentation draws on audio-visual illustration of the music and dance tradition of the Uduk people of the Sudan-Ethiopian borderlands to suggest how robust and adaptive it has been in the face not only of European colonialism but also displacement as a result of post-colonial civil wars. Once banned by missionaries, the people even now refuse to mix the 'traditional' forms with Christian worship.

Long abstract:

Speakers of Uduk and neighbouring groups of the Sudan-Ethiopian borderlands have an apparently conservative tradition of circular dance forms around ensembles of percussion and wind instruments. The basic musical patterns of these performances resonate with many of the traditional participatory rhythms of productive work. During the period of British rule in the Sudan, the dances, and even the sounds of percussion groups, were regarded as immoral and banned by missionaries. Since displacement of the people by civil war, these dances have not only 'survived' among the refugees (though instruments may have to be created from 'European' bric-à-brac), but at least one dance-form thought obsolete has reappeared. The symbolic form of the circular dance, in particular, defines an egalitarian space peculiar to its participants and turns its back on the 'outside' world. At the same time, Christianity has become very popular in the refugee camps, but the people themselves have kept the music and choreography of church performance totally separate from the 'traditional' forms. Like the choreography of public meetings organized by chiefs or refugee officials, church congregations sit down passively in rows to face 'authority' and its formal language. Hymns are sung with precise schoolroom discipline, unlike the freestyle songs of the circular dance. Our multimedia presentation, based on audio-visual material collected over four decades, illustrates the powerful role that the choreography of music and dance performance can play in the self-definition of a displaced social world. We offer it as an example of 'a privileged site in which to explore the creative interchange between the local and the global'.