The Tango in Translation: Intertextuality, Filmic Representation, and Performing Argentine Tango in the United States

Emily J Mcmanus

doi:10.21992/t9w34w

Abstract

This article analyzes representations of the Argentine tango by the U.S. media utilizing Farzaneh Farahzad’s theory of “translation as intertextual practice” and Lawrence Venuti’s theory of translated “adaptations.” I argue that the juxtaposition of Latin American and European cultural stereotypes within filmic representations of the tango has created and reinforced a highly racialized master discourse (Said Faiq) that continues to influence how the Argentine tango is perceived in the United States today. Because cultural translation occurs between a hegemonic culture and a marginalized culture, representations of the tango in the United States both create and reinforce a master discourse that inextricably ties the tango to an exoticized and eroticized Latin “Other.”   I conclude by discuss how the racialized and sexualized narratives discussed throughout this paper are integrated into contemporary performance of the tango. I draw on ethnographic research with tango communities throughout the United States to illustrate how 20th century filmic representations of the tango continue to motivate, influence, and inform how, when, and why the Argentine tango is performed by U.S. dancers and musicians. Films analyzed include Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, Some Like it Hot, Last Tango in Paris, and The Scent of a Woman, as well as a variety of lesser-known films and television advertisements. Although a large variety of 20th century films feature the tango, the films discussed in this paper were selected for analysis due to the frequency with which they are referenced by tango aficionados and contemporary tango dancers, musicians, and deejays performing throughout the United States today.

Highlights

Throughout the 20th and into the 21stcentury, the Argentine tango has been the subject of a wide variety of theatrical productions, silent and Hollywood movies, drawn and digitally animated cartoons, paintings and photographs, and print and television advertisements
“passion” and “seduction” are central components of how the tango has been represented to the American public since the early twentieth century
Such representations are indicative of a process of translation in which an exoticized cultural product is adapted in order to be approachable and understandable to a North American audience

Summary

Introduction

Throughout the 20th and into the 21stcentury, the Argentine tango has been the subject of a wide variety of theatrical productions, silent and Hollywood movies, drawn and digitally animated cartoons, paintings and photographs, and print and television advertisements. Filmic interpretations of the tango that emerged as early as 1921 became “intertexts” in Kristeva’s original formulation, as they engage with past, present, and future representations through direct and indirect intertextual quotation while creating and reinforcing tango’s highly racialized master discourse This is significant considering the extent to which media representations inform performance practice among contemporary tango dancers, musicians, and deejays throughout the United States. The extent to which Americanized representation of the Argentine tango draw from exoticized Latin American stereotypes and representations of European elitism is increasingly relevant when understood in dialogue with U.S tanguera/os who, while often attracted to the genre because of the sexuality it represents, frequently explain their ongoing participation by discussing their individual identification with the tango because of its European influences. As the most visible and approachable translations of the tango, the dual representations of Latin American and European cultural stereotypes perpetuated by the U.S media are unknowingly embodied and rearticulated in contemporary practice and have a very real effect on the construction of a primarily Anglo-American, heterosexual, and heteronormative U.S tango community

Filmic Representations of the Tango

Tango in Less Prominent Films and Television Advertisements

Findings

Conclusions and Larger Implications