Ebooks for the Classroom+Faculty

Choreographies of African Identities: Negritude, Dance, and the National Ballet of Senegal
ISBN: 9780252090783
Platform/Publisher: JSTOR / University of Illinois Press
Digital rights: Users: unlimited; Printing: chapter; Download: chapter
Subjects: Dance -- Anthropological aspects -- Senegal; Blacks -- Race identity -- Senegal; National Ballet of Senegal;

Choreographies of African Identities traces interconnected interpretative frameworks around and about the National Ballet of Senegal. Using the metaphor of a dancing circle Castaldi's arguments cover the full spectrum of performance, from production to circulation and reception. Castaldi first situates the reader in a North American theater, focusing on the relationship between dancers and audiences as that between black performers and white spectators. She then examines the work of the National Ballet in relation to Léopold Sédar Senghor's Négritude ideology and cultural politics. Finally, the author addresses the circulation of dances in the streets, discotheques, and courtyards of Dakar, drawing attention to women dancers' occupation of the urban landscape.

Francesca Castaldi is an independent dance scholar and ethnographer.