During the Hemispheric Institute of Performance and Politics Fourth Annual Encuentro, Angeline Shaka and Victoria Cuellar conducted three interviews with the scholars Berta Jottar, Josh Kun, and Daniel Banks. We asked them similar questions on the authenticity, ownership, and performance of 'traditional art' forms (particularly music and dance) that travel beyond their designated places of origin into various performance spaces. What follows are the transcripts from the 3 interviews. We hope to open a dialogue on this subject as a way of understanding how culture is negotiated along both real and imaginary borders.
Angeline Shaka's Reflection Piece
In this reflection piece I am endeavoring to interrogate dance and how dance deals with notions of authority, identity, memory, and translation, especially as it crosses borders. My two main points of departure for this interrogation are through tourist productions and the role of the critic in response to interviews with Josh Kun and Daniel Banks. The greater realm in which these points reside are how we as cultural consumers choose to look at representations of 'other' in various performance forms as cultural borders of our world continue to dissolve.
Victoria Cuellar's Reflection Piece
In this piece, I am reflecting on my experiences this summer as a participant of both the Hemispheric Institutes fourth annual Encuentro and as a participant of the Leadership Alliance Early Identification Program at New York University. In both programs, I have attempted to look at two separate but connected issues tied to music and dance forms in Latin America: first, the issue of tracing culture through music and dance and second, the issues of identifying origin and ownership. This reflection piece hopes to show the ongoing process of research, discussion, and participation I went through this summer, as well as illuminate the types of questions and issues I have been negotiating regarding identity, culture, authenticity, and art.