230655 Everynight Life: Dance in Cultural Studies (S) (WiSe 2015/2016)

“Dance is the hidden language of the soul" (choreographer Martha Graham)

Many people dance in one way or another: formally in dancing schools or clubs; informally at parties, in discos, in living rooms or on tables. Fewer people still dance professionally. Dance as an art form is held in high esteem in Western cultures; dance as a sport an audience's favorite. From a Cultural Studies point of view, dancing is also an utterly immediate way of expressing cultural knowledge and communal and individual history via the body. This means of cultural expression becomes even more intriguing when seen through a transnational and transcultural scholarly lens, since dances are travelers and shape shifters that effortlessly tour the globe, adapting to and influencing new host cultures on their way. In this seminar we will investigate a variety of dances, mostly from Latin America, as non-verbal communicative tools and backdrops for cultural allegiances as well as sites of resistance against oppression and ostracism.