| Session 14 | Rewriting |
| SanSan Kwan | Feminist Ethnography and Dance Ethnography as Mutual Analytics |
| This paper seeks to explore the intersections of feminist ethnography and dance ethnography in a study of urban space and ethnic identity. . I am working on a book-length project having to do with how cities in the Chinese diaspora – Hong Kong, Taipei, and New York – move and how their distinct motion is reflective and productive of each of these cities’ very fraught relationships to a notion of Chineseness. My concern, however, has been how do we perceive the collective movement of an entire city? The field of feminist ethnography has long argued for the value of the autobiographical in cultural research. This paper will draw on work in feminist ethnography in order to argue for a kind of personally-centered kinesthetic methodology as a way to apprehend city space. In so doing this paper seeks to make mutual contributions to the two larger fields of feminist ethnography and dance ethnography. | |
| Deepa Dharmadhikari | Puppet Mistresses: Fan Vids that Recontextualise the Performative Body |
| Fan vids (music videos that use re-edited footage from mass media such as TV shows and films) are part of a largely underground historically female fan culture that negotiates hegemonic capitalist mass media in ways markedly different from the popular perception of a passive, complicit audience. The body of the actor, whether a fictional or a publicity-cultivated character, is subverted to rewrite the 'official' media narrative with multiple and contradictory texts of movement that complicate the originally intended sexual, social, political, racial and gendered lenses. Close readings of sources from popular culture media including Buffy the Vampire Slayer, 300, and Britney Spears' footage are situated within the online community discourse(s) surrounding each vid to examine how the idea of a female gaze has been constructed as a communal and self-aware one—both vid creator and viewers functioning on a shared level of assumptions, leading to a layered, collaborative reading that rewards insider knowledge. | |
| Margaret Morrison | Clothes Make the Woman: Women Tap Dancers and the Iconography of the Suit |
| There have always been women tap dancers, even though tap dance has always been considered "a man’s game." Many of these women hoofers have donned suit jacket, trousers and low-heeled shoes, some as male impersonators, some in feminized suits cut to show womanly form, and some wore male suits to command respect and indicate that they were serious rhythm tap dancers--jazz musicians with their feet. A 1945 film clip of Juanita Pitts shows an African American, woman, rhythm tap dancer wearing a men’s suit and low-heeled shoes. An analysis of this clip, and images and footage of tap dancing women in suits from the 1920s to present--including Alberta Whitman, Jeni LeGon, Eleanor Powell, and Brenda Bufalino--reveals what the iconography of the suit can tell us about gender, race, and the struggle over authenticity in tap dance. | |
| SanSan Kwan (Ph.D, NYU) is an assistant professor in the Department of Theatre Arts and Dance at Cal State Los Angeles. Her research focuses on Asian/Asian American contemporary dance and urban space. She has just contributed a chapter on dance in Hong Kong during the 1997 handover to the upcoming collection, Planes of Composition: Dance, Theory, and the Global, edited by André Lepecki and Jenn Joy. Currently, she is working on a book manuscript about dance and city space in the Chinese diaspora. She will be a Visiting Assistant Professor in the Dance Department at UC Riverside fall 2008 through winter 2009. | |
| Deepa Dharmadhikari grew up in New Delhi, India, and is currently attending the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities, in Minneapolis, USA. | |
| Margaret Morrison is a rhythm tap soloist, choreographer and producer who teaches and performs across the United States, Europe and Brazil. She is a graduate of Barnard College and has taught in the Barnard Dance Department since 1997. Her courses include tap technique and a studio/lecture course "Tap as an American Art | |
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