Illuminating Cultural Terrains in Dance: A Symbiotic Approach to Analysis and Interpretation

Abstract

In a paper that I presented at Atarau Academic Symposium, and later developed in an article for Dance Research Aotearoa (Ashley, 2015), I argued that the colloquial understanding of dance as one universal language provides insufficient philosophical grounds for fostering a full understanding of contemporary, indigenous, intercultural dance. Nourishing an awareness of how dance can be understood not as one but many languages is important because it can, I contend, inform ethical practices in dance, and foster better understanding and appreciation of dance practices from diverse cultures. In the article for Dance Research Aotearoa I stated that:

Translating dances as semiotically, language-laden signs is quite a different approach to the application of Western Laban analysis and as such can reveal more about the intercultural terrains of indigenous contemporary dance.

Moreover, it could go some way towards establishing what marks ‘indigenous contemporary dance’ as different from other contemporary dance; a question that was discussed by delegates of Atarau. (2015)