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oyceterThe academic geek in me loves that the introduction of the book starts out with terms and definitions; Dixon Gottschild notes that she very deliberately uses the word “coon” to make a racial point. She further explains why she uses “thick,” “full,” and “natural” instead of “fuzzy,” “kinky,” or “nappy,” defines her use of “Africanist” as describing concepts from Africa and the African diaspora and “Europeanist” as describing concepts from Europe and European America. I’ll be adopting those terms as well in this post.
Dixon Gottschild splits the book up into sections focusing on different parts of the black body -- feet, butt, skin/hair -- with another explanation that she understands the discomfort some people have with this sectioning, given how often black bodies are already colonized and dehumanized. But she notes that she is trying to go through these concepts to understand them and hopefully to overcome them.
Have I mentioned that I like terms, definitions, caveats, and precise language?
Anyway. The bulk of the book looks at the black dancing body, and more specifically on the black dancing body in the world of modern and contemporary dance. Dixon Gottschild doesn’t touch on other areas such as partner dance or unchoreographed dance. She interviewed quite a few dancers, POC and white (mostly POC) and uses those interviews as a launch pad, interweaving her own theories and ideas with the interviews and her own experience as a black dancer.
She touches on racism, cultural appropriation, spirituality, and the divide between and borrowing among Africanist and Europeanist dance tradition. I particularly liked this because it was a look at a very specific topic using the tools and language of anti-racism; it’s been nice talking about cultural appropriation and whatnot on LJ in general terms, but much more satisfying having someone focus on cultural appropriation in a very specific area.
I’m not even sure where to begin, and of course I put this off, so I can’t remember the book that well now. First off, Dixon Gottschild notes that some of traits of Africanist dance include group participation (dancers dancing in the middle of a ring of people clapping out the beat), a grounded quality evinced in bent legs and a slightly pitched forward body, moving separate parts of the body separately, often to separate beats (hip swivelling to the main beat and snapping to the syncopated rhythms, frex), and a focus on improvisation. She says traits of Europeanist dance are very much the opposite, focusing on the body moving together as a whole, movement focused on the spine, an upright position, and a more formal and choreographed nature. I have no idea if this is true or not, but since Dixon Gottschild has written several books on dance and taught dance and been dancing, I am definitely taking her word on it.
She also notes that when she makes distinctions between Africanist and Europeanist dance traditions, she is not saying that any of the traits are intrinsic to African or European cultures, or that any of these differences can be attributed to race. To further emphasize that, she interviews several black dancers dancing Europeanist dance (a lot of classical ballet) and white dancers dancing Africanist dance.
The book also covers how the black body was frequently seen as “unfit” for Europeanist dance: the feet were not arched enough, the back too curved, the butt too distinct and not tucked in under the spine. Dixon Gottschild quickly debunks that, noting that white dancers trained in Africanist dance learn to move in an Africanist manner, while black dancers trained in Europeanist dance learn to move in a Europeanist manner. But she also notes that the stereotype of the black body as somehow being unfit persists and causes a lot of psychological damage.
A lot of the territory in the book is familiar ground, like the constant projection of sexuality onto Africanist dance, the focus on the black body somehow not being right (despite all facts to the contrary), the difficulty black dancers have trying to make it in Europeanist dance traditions, typecasting, limited opportunities for starring roles, being stereotyped if they dance “too African” and also being stereotyped if they dance “too white,” and through it all, the constant devaluation of black dancers and of the Africanist dance tradition. But again, it’s fascinating reading it in context of dance, a world that I know pretty much nothing about.
Dixon Gottschild briefly talks about the history of the Africanist dance tradition but doesn’t go into it in depth; the focus of the book is more on contemporary dancers and their worlds. I found that she gave enough information for context, particularly when she touched on the move from attempted cultural genocide to cultural appropriation. Slaves were forbidden their own dances and music, frequently on pain of corporal punishment and/or death. They frequently got around restrictions by adapting Europeanist dance into various animal dances (fox trot, turkey trot, etc. I can’t remember if Dixon Gottschild notes that the term “animal dance” applies solely because of the names of the dances and not as a means of equating black with animalistic behavior, though I’m pretty sure that’s how she’s using it, given her care with language) or by creating shuffling steps (picking up your feet meant dancing, which meant punishment at the hands of Christian slaveholders). Then, of course, those dances were taken and dressed up for a white audience (hello Vernon and Irene Castle!), all while black people were still being condemned as being “animalistic” and “too sexual” for how they danced.
I could probably go on and on and on about cultural appropriation and dance, but I will save that for her next book!
I’m also not even getting into everything in the book. I really enjoyed reading most of this, though I had some problems with her section on spirituality and dance. I wish she had focused more on non-Christian spirituality, particularly given what![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
delux_vivens has told me about the forced conversion of slaves in the US.
My other complaints are that the book is too short and doesn’t cover enough dance and that the book doesn’t include a DVD, but really, this is more me wanting to know more and watch more and see what Dixon Gottschild thinks of hip hop and lindy and the swing era and etc. etc. etc. and not really a complaint about the book itself.
I suspect people not interested in dance would like this as well; it serves as a great look at cultural appropriation and the colonization and decolonization of POC bodies, and if you are interested in dance, even better! I ran out and ILLed her book on the swing era on the strength of this and am very excited to read all about lindy hop! Ok, and other stuff too, but a lot about lindy hop!
Highly recommended.
Dixon Gottschild splits the book up into sections focusing on different parts of the black body -- feet, butt, skin/hair -- with another explanation that she understands the discomfort some people have with this sectioning, given how often black bodies are already colonized and dehumanized. But she notes that she is trying to go through these concepts to understand them and hopefully to overcome them.
Have I mentioned that I like terms, definitions, caveats, and precise language?
Anyway. The bulk of the book looks at the black dancing body, and more specifically on the black dancing body in the world of modern and contemporary dance. Dixon Gottschild doesn’t touch on other areas such as partner dance or unchoreographed dance. She interviewed quite a few dancers, POC and white (mostly POC) and uses those interviews as a launch pad, interweaving her own theories and ideas with the interviews and her own experience as a black dancer.
She touches on racism, cultural appropriation, spirituality, and the divide between and borrowing among Africanist and Europeanist dance tradition. I particularly liked this because it was a look at a very specific topic using the tools and language of anti-racism; it’s been nice talking about cultural appropriation and whatnot on LJ in general terms, but much more satisfying having someone focus on cultural appropriation in a very specific area.
I’m not even sure where to begin, and of course I put this off, so I can’t remember the book that well now. First off, Dixon Gottschild notes that some of traits of Africanist dance include group participation (dancers dancing in the middle of a ring of people clapping out the beat), a grounded quality evinced in bent legs and a slightly pitched forward body, moving separate parts of the body separately, often to separate beats (hip swivelling to the main beat and snapping to the syncopated rhythms, frex), and a focus on improvisation. She says traits of Europeanist dance are very much the opposite, focusing on the body moving together as a whole, movement focused on the spine, an upright position, and a more formal and choreographed nature. I have no idea if this is true or not, but since Dixon Gottschild has written several books on dance and taught dance and been dancing, I am definitely taking her word on it.
She also notes that when she makes distinctions between Africanist and Europeanist dance traditions, she is not saying that any of the traits are intrinsic to African or European cultures, or that any of these differences can be attributed to race. To further emphasize that, she interviews several black dancers dancing Europeanist dance (a lot of classical ballet) and white dancers dancing Africanist dance.
The book also covers how the black body was frequently seen as “unfit” for Europeanist dance: the feet were not arched enough, the back too curved, the butt too distinct and not tucked in under the spine. Dixon Gottschild quickly debunks that, noting that white dancers trained in Africanist dance learn to move in an Africanist manner, while black dancers trained in Europeanist dance learn to move in a Europeanist manner. But she also notes that the stereotype of the black body as somehow being unfit persists and causes a lot of psychological damage.
A lot of the territory in the book is familiar ground, like the constant projection of sexuality onto Africanist dance, the focus on the black body somehow not being right (despite all facts to the contrary), the difficulty black dancers have trying to make it in Europeanist dance traditions, typecasting, limited opportunities for starring roles, being stereotyped if they dance “too African” and also being stereotyped if they dance “too white,” and through it all, the constant devaluation of black dancers and of the Africanist dance tradition. But again, it’s fascinating reading it in context of dance, a world that I know pretty much nothing about.
Dixon Gottschild briefly talks about the history of the Africanist dance tradition but doesn’t go into it in depth; the focus of the book is more on contemporary dancers and their worlds. I found that she gave enough information for context, particularly when she touched on the move from attempted cultural genocide to cultural appropriation. Slaves were forbidden their own dances and music, frequently on pain of corporal punishment and/or death. They frequently got around restrictions by adapting Europeanist dance into various animal dances (fox trot, turkey trot, etc. I can’t remember if Dixon Gottschild notes that the term “animal dance” applies solely because of the names of the dances and not as a means of equating black with animalistic behavior, though I’m pretty sure that’s how she’s using it, given her care with language) or by creating shuffling steps (picking up your feet meant dancing, which meant punishment at the hands of Christian slaveholders). Then, of course, those dances were taken and dressed up for a white audience (hello Vernon and Irene Castle!), all while black people were still being condemned as being “animalistic” and “too sexual” for how they danced.
I could probably go on and on and on about cultural appropriation and dance, but I will save that for her next book!
I’m also not even getting into everything in the book. I really enjoyed reading most of this, though I had some problems with her section on spirituality and dance. I wish she had focused more on non-Christian spirituality, particularly given what
delux_vivens has told me about the forced conversion of slaves in the US. My other complaints are that the book is too short and doesn’t cover enough dance and that the book doesn’t include a DVD, but really, this is more me wanting to know more and watch more and see what Dixon Gottschild thinks of hip hop and lindy and the swing era and etc. etc. etc. and not really a complaint about the book itself.
I suspect people not interested in dance would like this as well; it serves as a great look at cultural appropriation and the colonization and decolonization of POC bodies, and if you are interested in dance, even better! I ran out and ILLed her book on the swing era on the strength of this and am very excited to read all about lindy hop! Ok, and other stuff too, but a lot about lindy hop!
Highly recommended.