Introduction: Global Perspectives in Ethnographic Fieldwork, Theory, and the Representation of Traditional Dance

Abstract

The editors of this volume propose a selection of dance ethnographies that represent individual approaches to fieldwork through the medium of traditional dance from around the globe. The focus on identity, embodiment, and culture is designed to consider the intellectual issues that have been prominent in recent discourses on ethnographic research and embodied reflexive practice in dance. We use the concept of reflexive practice to situate the importance of participatory approaches in fieldwork that require a position of self-examination, or ‘a process of self-reference’ (Davies, 1999, p. 4) on the part of the ethnographer. This is distinct from (although similar to) reflective practice, a term commonly used in professional practice for assisting learning through self-evaluation. The term ‘dance ethnography’ embraces a number of theoretical positions but its specific methodological focus is on the study of dance through field research. Dance ethnography as an approach allows its scholars to venture across diverse populations and cultures, where a reflexive process takes place in the analysis and writing of the social and cultural practices of the people encountered during fieldwork. Reflexive ethnography arguably developed from feminist theorizing, through scholars such as anthropologist Lila Abu-Lughod (1990) who first identified a ‘crisis of difference’ in the way that women’s voices were presented in ethnographies.