AADH Thursday - Jan 18

Sacred and Secular dance Voodoo Early Plantation dancesNew Orleans and Congo SquareANGEL

Guidelines for Project One and EC PaperQuiz # 1 – open from after class to Friday at 6 PMProject One - model paper

Questions from Tuesday

Black Dance of the Caribbean, 1518-1900

Caribbean circumstances

French and Spanish Catholics - more liberal than Protestants in US.

Church wanted to save the slave’s souls - Let them enjoy their dances

Drum critical to this history - Rhythm is essential – variety of percussive instruments

The importance of the drum and consequences of it’s loss

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Drums and Percussion

Variuos sizes - played with hands, sticks and feet

Bonjour or Banjo - a box with four strings (horsehair), played by fingers - percussive style

Rattle - calabash, a gourd filled with pebbles on a sticks

Drum - banned in some places as early as 1700 (believed to cause rebellion)

The importance of the drum and consequences of it’s loss

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Primary Caribbean Dances

Calenda - a favorite from Guinea. Banned by 1724, considered immodest and a fear of large groups of slaves gathering

Two lines, male and female. Slap the thighs together. Couples in a clapping ring - advance and retreat

Lead singer improvised song with a chorus refrain. Drum tells them when to advance and retreat.

Men and women both spin, arms are raised, elbows in close

Rigorous meter, dancers replace one another when tired.

Bodies twist on their axis/ advance toe and heel

Primary Caribbean Dances

Chica/Bamboula

Woman alone - immobile upper body, pelvis gyrations, then a man joins in the rhythm and displays his agility.

Whites see this as lustful and debauchery

Rotation of the hips, quiet upper body, women tease, men pursue

Primary Caribbean Dances

Juba - a distinct dance of competition and skill

Performed in a ring, solo vs solo, exchange of the dancer who loses or is fatigued first.

Slapping of thighs “ patting juba” is part of accompaniment

Congo - a circle dance to a song, solo

Patting Juba - “Juba dis and Juba dat”

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Primary Caribbean Dances

John Canoe - Jonkonnu

Leaders were best male dancers, chosen for agilityBearded masks with ox horns and boars tusks at the mouth, costume made of rags with goat horns hanging off of it.

Men followed by red and blue women sets

Dancing as if possessed (embodied) by the devil (a god/spirit)

Jonkonnu Festival

Paste board house worn on the headfilled with puppets - taken to cemetaryto be filled with spirits of ancestors.

Primary Caribbean Dances

A dance of Social commentary at Christmas

a time of greatest license among slaves, whites and blacks drank and socialized together, short period of equality.

Whites conscious of the potential for violence and rebellion

Whites hoped the good humor would prepare slaves for a long year of slave labor. More than a dance

Primary Caribbean Dances

Funeral dances

Dead spirit honored and entertained so it will leave earth - be a positive force for the descendants

Dance also serves as emotional release for grief

Night funeral dances - slaves had to work till sundown - became wild and ultimately banned

Dancing serves to reaffirm community solidarity after dance.

Primary Caribbean Dances

Crop Over dances

When last crop is in - a time of celebration and the slaves mingled with whites. White dance forms predominate. Scotch reels/ country dances with fiddle.

Dancing here is possible origin of the cakewalk so big in US

Sacred Dancing – VoodooDance - a vehicle to communicate with the gods - personal,

concentrated, embodied, physical more than mental

Religion part of everyday life - not a once a week obligation

Religious practice included rituals both set and improvised

Rituals based in song and dance - the supreme experience is possession. A god choose you to speak through

Syncretic blend of African beliefs/rituals and Catholic dogma evolved into voodoo

Sacred Dancing – Voodoo

Voodoo is Dahomean term for deity

Vaudou, Vodu, Voodoo - ancestor spirit to be worshipped

Standardized in Haiti between 1750 and 1790

Loa - gods chief loa = Damballa = serpent god

Snake is all powerful- an earth goddess - Adam succumbed to the snake, all depend on the earth

Loas had counterpoint in Catholic saints - St. Patrick associated with Damballa

Sacred Dancing – Voodoo

Three divisions (pantheons) of Voodoo

Rada Dahomey - deities from Dahomean kingdom of W Africa - benevolent, paternal. Largest group of loa.

Petro - patrons of aggressive action. Born of rage against circumstances of enslavement.

Various divisions of Congo

Each division has particular drums, songs and loa. 1000’s of loa - Each dead ancestor can become one. The loa have the tastes, morality and ambitions of modern man.

Sacred Dancing – VoodooPossession by the loa is to be “mounted” or ridden as the “horse” for the loa. The

possessed person expresses the personality of the loa.

Potemta - center pole around which dances circle, the entry way of the loa

Priestess (mambo) Priest (harensi, hamga) often become possessed

Dances and Loa - the loa is revealed by the possessed person’s dance. Also specific drum rhythms call certain loa.

Yanvalou done for Damballa and Agwe Yonvalu - undulation - snakelike sideways steps, writhing, twist, slither

Loas come to instruct and bless participants. Each loa has a drum rhythm and distinctive dances.

Sacred Dancing – VoodooPrimary Loas

1) Legba - guardian of the crossroads - a limping dance / or one legged acrobatic twirling

2) Agwe - undulations wavelike motion down arms and spine from shoulders, water

3) Erzulie - dance an attitude, feminine grace – in arms and wrists (Virgin Mother)

4) Asaka - mountain and field – god of agriculture bending low as if planting or hoeing,

5) Guede - brisk like rhythm frankly obscene, high kicks pelvis in front, figure of life and death – keeper of the cemetery. Also sexuality. Women bump their pelvis to him for positive fertility.

Livings gods of Haiti

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Sacred Dancing – Ring ShoutRing Shout - this retained much of the African character of sacred dance-

fit within the restrictions of Protestant Church

Crossing the feet forbidden - a side to side shuffle

Drumming - also forbidden after mid 18th century - caused emphasis on hand clapping and foot stamping.

Hand clapping and foot stamping, most African survival – allowed under above rules. Dance went in a counter clockwise direction - in Africa directed to the ancestors/gods - turn back time.

Ring Shout

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Dance on the Plantations

Changes in US

In US more significant changes - Africanisms diminish

Drums become outlawed, new forms develop

New African slaves continue to renew traditions and rhythms

Slave trade abolished around 1800 - West Indian slave infusions re-invigorate the US African slave revolution

Dance on the PlantationsChanges in USCato conspiracy or Stono insurrection 1739 South Carolina

What were the implications of the Stono insurrection?

Drums used to sustain the march of the escaping slaves to Florida. Thereafter drums were banned and also assembly of slaves prohibiting socializing during their infrequent holidays

Dance on the PlantationsSlaves would gather to dance on own plantation or with a

pass go to a dance at a nearby plantation

Buck, Buck and Wing

Pigeon wing

Jig - based on Irish jigs, a competitive and solo dance

Cakewalk - used banjos

Buzzard Lope

Juba - African origin Djouba (sacred) in US, secular

The Cakewalk

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The Cakewalk

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Dance in New OrleansSpecial circumstances - founded by French and remains culturally French

(1762-1800 officially Spanish) returned to France, sold to US in 1804

Catholic more tolerant

Regular influx and contact with authentic African sources, especially after Haiti Rebellion 1804

Code Noir - any drop of white blood gives you privileges over all black,

people of color a clear a mid level class. Jim Crow laws will change this to any drop of black blood

denied your rights. Cannot marry white or black, women therefore mainly became

mistresses of white men

Dance in New Orleans

Quadroon Balls- 1/4 black, octaroon- 1/8 black

Formal balls held to introduce women of color to white males of high society, quadroon mothers attended and

bargained for the official keeping of their daughters.

Men of color, out of luck, few women to marry

Dances were strictly white fashion, mimicked Paris waltzes, etc. Gens de colour rejected all that was black culture

White society women were also upset because their men were pre-occupied with the very beautiful quadroon women

Dance in New OrleansCongo Square

Congo plains area NW of city, designated as a place for African slaves to dance on Sundays until sundown

Under surveillance of authorities, yet allowed to regularly congregate in large numbers

Drums allowed, gombay mentioned, baboula

Started around 1805 until mid 1880’s began with infusion of West Indian slaves and owners from Haiti, ended with Northern migration of blacks to factories in cities (1817 official pronouncement, after Louisiana purchase)

Dance in New OrleansCongo Square

West Indian forms predominate, Calenda, Chica, Congo, Bamboula

At first, public derision of this spectacle, uncivilized and lascivious to white and religious observers

Later becomes predominant, many concentric circles of dancers. descriptions of frenzied leaps, rhythmic upper body movements,

large group improvisation around central dancer