Dance Journal, Week 5 (Feb 16, 2010)

DNCE 320
Journal, Week 5
February 16, 2010

Asante, Kariamu W. "Commonatities in African Dance: An Aesthetic Foundation." Moving History / Dancing Cultures: A Dance History Reader. Ed. Ann Dills and Ann Cooper Albright. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan UP, 2001. 144-151. Print.

In this paper, the author asserts that “African dance is a complex art in an advanced form,” and presents a description of an “African aesthetic” that is common to all African dance. The author points out that while cultural anthropologists and ethnomusicologists have provided insights into African arts, they lack the expertise to analyze specific movements and steps in African dance. Asante describes seven “senses” that, when combined with oral tradition, make for a commonality between and among all dance styles that have developed within Africa and within the African Diaspora, even though they come from different peoples with different languages, cultures, and geography. These seven “senses” are:

1. Polyrhythm, a motion sense in which movement and rhythm are intertwined. The author claims that this sense is inherent in all African dances.
2. Polycentrism, a time sense in which both slow and fast can occur in the same time frame. I have to admit that this one is hard to explain (and I'm not sure the author did a very good job). As a musician, I tend to explain things with musical concepts, and I think polycentrism is best explained by talking about the relationship of macrobeats and microbeats. A macrobeat is, like the name implies, a “big beat,” which can be subdivided into microbeats, or “small beats.” You can play many microbeats within one macrobeat. Whether something feels like a macrobeat or a microbeat depends a lot on tempo. What sometimes happens – and here is where the polycentrism comes in – is that at certain tempi when there are a lot of microbeats a listener begins to “float” over them and a new, slower macrobeat will emerge. (Kind of like what happens when something accelerates enough from 4/4 time where it makes more sense to feel it in 2/2.)

   Here my prof wrote: "Bravo!"

3. Curvilinearity, the circular quality of form, shape, and structure that occur in African arts, especially dance.
4. Dimensionality, the sense of multiple layers or textures. The author likens it to the “extrashape and vibration that occur during a dance.”
5. Epic memory, the spiritual sense that an artist draws upon while creating a work. It is present not only within the finished work of art, but also in the creation itself.
6. Holism, the sense that the parts of a work of art are not emphasized over the whole.
7. Repetition, the sense of intensification over time, when “enough time” has passed (not necessarily a specific amount of time).

Asante also cautions that “there is no universal aesthetic without personal reflection,” and that African dance is difficult to categorize because of the thousands of ethnic groups as well as the 400 million people in Africa (and the 150 million of the Diaspora).


Strother, Z. S. "Invention and Reinvention in the Traditional Arts." Moving History / Dancing Cultures: A Dance History Reader. Ed. Ann Dills and Ann Cooper Albright. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan UP, 2001. 152-164. Print.

I have to love any scholarly paper that uses Star Trek as an example! (I actually think the author could have gone farther with that example of collaboration, especially given the well-known back-and-forth that has developed between the Trek “fandom” and the writers and producers of the shows and novels. But I digress....) This paper makes the claim that the traditional arts of Zaire are best viewed through the lens of pop culture (rather than “high art”) because it recognizes the collaborative nature of such art. To illustrate the way that even traditional art can change in reaction to “modern life,” Strother uses the example of the Gindongo (gi)tshi? dance, developed in the 1970s. The dance was originally meant to be a protest against the “gerontocracy” of the status quo. The artist who developed the dance even went so far as to commission a mask that deliberately avoided using traditional design elements. In subsequent years, however, other artists have started performing the dance and have changed not only the hand-gestures, but also the design of the mask (they use traditionally-styled masks). They have changed the nature of the dance from a protest to an ironic confirmation that the young are often powerless to change the system. Strother points out that Africanists (an term left undefined in the paper, I think it means “those who study African culture(s)”), like many scholars of Western culture, often overlook or dismiss “the role of collaboration and dialogue” in creative endeavors. The author posits that this may be a reaction to negative Western stereotypes of Africa, and the result of a desire to present African art as “as good as” Western art, using Western standards rather than African standards. By doing this, such critics miss the point. Art should be judged or appreciated in the context of its own culture and not by any outside standards.

My prof wrote: "Agreed."

PRACTICE JOURNAL

I practiced several times this weekend, often doing just a section of our dance at a time. I'm sure I looked a bit silly as I danced in front of the bathroom mirror – about as silly as I must have looked as an 8 year old practicing disco dancing! I did show my husband the entire dance sequence so far, using our kitchen and living room as an ersatz dancefloor. I am still having trouble with the chest contraction/expansion move. I don't know what it is, but it just feels like I'm very stiff. I need to practice that move in front of the mirror some more to see if I can figure out what I'm doing wrong. Maybe I'll even video-tape myself so I can do the move without having to look in the mirror at the same time (since that subtly changes the body position). I'm sure I will feel less "silly" as I get more comfortable with the dance. Meanwhile, I will "fake it until I make it!"

My prof wrote: "Go for a circular feeling; a "push" or expansion, followed by an equal or slightly relaxed "pull," like a roller coaster loop, if that makes sense."

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