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Beljaars, Ine Johanna Sebastiana

University of British Columbia

This study investigated Afro-Latin partner dance’s cultural history and politics in the Netherlands. The first chapter discusses the background of the study, its academic and social relevance, the theories, and methods that inform this research and the researcher’s positionality. Through archival research and oral history interviews, I present a cultural history of the Dutch salsa scene from its development from the mid-1970s to the turn of the millennium in chapter two, which does so by tracing the transoceanic connections and cultural exchanges that shaped the rise of salsa as a popular dance form in the Netherlands. Drawing on cultural anthropology, dance and performance studies, critical whiteness studies, cultural studies, and feminist, critical race, queer, and postcolonial theory, the following three ethnographic chapters explore questions related to identity, belonging, racialization, and postcoloniality through the lens of Afro-Latin partner dance. Chapter three explores the function of dance in negotiating various aspects of identity, including gender, race/ethnicity, class, and age. It examines Afro-Latin partner dance as a platform for inclusion to counter feelings of exclusion in everyday life. By analyzing exotification and discourses of desire, it also investigates reproductions of racial and gender biases and erotic racism within the dance scene. Chapter four analyzes the meanings and reproduction of “Dutchness” among racialized dancers. Through affect and queer theory, it investigates processes of identification and disidentification and sheds light on mechanisms of exclusion as well as strategies of resistance. Chapter five probes racial subjectivity and national identification among White dancers and theorizes the choreography of progressive Whiteness by examining projections of exotic otherness and analyzes the practices and processes involved in the reproduction of the White subject. The chapter concludes by discussing the limitations of existing theories of disidentification when applied to majoritarian subjects. Overall, by raising questions about negotiating identity and belonging in a postcolonial context and underscoring the necessity of deconstructing normative categories such as Dutchness through engaging with race as a critical aspect of cultural citizenship, this study offers insights into how cultural practices can reflect, reinforce, and challenge societal power structures. [An errata to this thesis/dissertation was made available on 2024-04-25.]

Text

2024-01-12

Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International

http://hdl.handle.net/2429/87238

Gender, Race, Sexuality and Social Justice

University of British Columbia

UBCV

http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/