After class this week, I looked up dance in the news. This video came up, showing Native Americans performing a typical dance style known as the 'Hoop Dance'. However, in this championship, the competition isn't the focal point, but the dance is. Unlike the other dances we've studied, the focus is the family and tradition of the dance, not winning the competition. I found this interesting, because even though it's competition based, it doesn't make the dance better or worse because of it. Do you think that competition is integral for the success of a dance? Why do we place so much importance on competition based dancing, instead of the beauty of dance itself?
Your post reminded my of the first part of the movie we watched. The first women discussed how they only danced for themselves and before competition they picked a person to dance for someone they loved. I thought this was a great way to dance at a competition because it means you're dancing just to dance, not to win. I think that American culture has a lot to do with why we place so much importance on dance. Everything in this culture is so competitive that sometimes we lose sight of why it was important in the first place.
ReplyDeleteGreat questions. I am a hoop dancer and I'm not even sure of how competition changes hoop dancing. The vast majority of Native American hoop dancing is exhibition, not competition. But, the competition does give a nice goal. If the World Championship ended, I'm not sure if the number of hoop dancers would drop. It totally might.
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I don't think that competition is necessary for the success of a dance, and I completely agree with Kim on the fact that American culture places a lot of competitive focus on ANYTHING (dance, sports, music). In this country, there is always a battle to be the best, and in my opinion, that definitely hinders the success of a dance because people may take for granted the meaning of the dance, its history, etc.
ReplyDeleteI don't think competition is vital to the success of any dance however I do think competitions are a way for dancers to set goals that motivate them to improve as well as help to mark progress. Competitions shouldn't restrict the freedom of creativity in a dance - dancers should be able to express themselves freely and innovate when appropriate.
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