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NEH Discussion Forum #4 (August 2024)
Please respond by August 21, 2024
Our final research question is:
- How do international perspectives on and research approaches to tango differ, and why are they important?
Following up on our Zoom Discussion #3, participants posed these questions:
- How do we find common ground between the disciplines?
How to reach readers outside our respective disciplines?
- What can each person contribute?
- Is there a project that you can envision growing out of the conference that we can work on together?
Since this is our last forum, if you have any questions that you’d like to pose to the group, please do so in the thread.
7 Responses
“Tango” is a common name to multiple aesthetic objects, that vary from one context to another in their meanings, their political economy, and their history as a practice. To put an obviously exaggerated example: the history, the present and the sonic, instrumental, and dancing features of Finnish Tango are quite different from Buenos Aires tango. Less exaggeratedly, tango performance and dance in Japan, the US, or France work in socioeconomic and cultural contexts very different from those of Buenos Aires (which in turn, encompass a variety of uses, from tourism to neighborhood to academic practice). We should therefore always provide contextual clues to the kind of “tango” we are talking about. At the same time, as anthropologist Claude Lévi-Strauss’ idea of “all versions making part of the myth,” the variability and heterogeneity of tango in different national and historical contexts also make part of the nature of our subject of study, “tango.” All this means that a) we can’t take for granted what we mean by “tango” when talking about it, and b) we need to read fellow analysts and practitioners from other parts of the world to further refine and enrich our own understanding of tango (regardless of each of our individual specific approaches to it).
At the conference, I would like to ask my colleagues about the *geography* of the sources, the experiences, and the dialogues that shape their work on tango.
In the same direction as Pablo expresses his thoughts, I have the same perspective and perhaps the same objectives.
As a person born and raised in Buenos Aires, with ancestors linked to tango, not only musically, but in customs; walking the streets of Buenos Aires and seeing it reflected in the musical phrasing, the way of speaking and walking of the porteño, I was always surprised that people from different cultures feel attracted to tango in all its facets.
I have received musicians from different latitudes intrigued by the rhythm of tango and how it works on the guitar.
I think that in this conference we will be able to cross visions and experiences from different latitudes, from Japan to the US, from Turkey to France.
I understand the different disciplines, but in my opinion the axis of tango starts from music, from there comes the dance, and then the word is articulated. Three pillars then taken to the “sainete” and then to the cinema.
I find it intriguing to know how each one came to tango, if from music, dance or lyrics!
Replies from Anahí Viladrich
How do international perspectives on and research approaches to tango differ, and why are they important?
International and research perspectives should address the “glocality” of tango, meaning the tension between its public, global expressions (e.g., international tango dancing competitions) and its local manifestations (e.g., typical Buenos Aires “milongas” that aim to maintain an authentic tango “style”). I truly feel that is also important for us (scholars and artists) to acknowledge that each research/artistic perspective has something salient to bring to the table (and/or tango salon): from novel analyses of the tango’s evolution to studies on the social composition of newer audiences that have fallen in love with it, among others.
Following up on our Zoom Discussion #3, participants posed these questions:
How do we find common ground between the disciplines?
I believe that one main way to find common ground among our disciplines is by contributing our unique expertise to shared questions that are relevant to both tango scholars and artists/practitioners.
How to reach readers outside our respective disciplines?
By writing in an accessible way (and avoiding jargon!) and by tapping into the most basic motivations that bring audiences to tango music and dancing.
What can each person contribute?
We could start by increasing our collective knowledge and sharing our unique expertise that has helped us build what I call “tango capital,” which involves different knowledge dimensions (and skills) within the tango field.
Is there a project that you can envision growing out of the conference that we can work on together?
I look forward to brainstorming with the conference participants about research projects that focus on the lives and careers of contemporary tango artists (why and how they have been involved with tango) vis-à-vis their specific perspectives regarding the genre’s ongoing, and potential evolution.
Finally, I want to add that the field of tango is interdisciplinary by nature as it involves a unique and rich history of music, dance and poetry, amid its changing social construction, which crosses lines of social class, racial/ethnic divides and global geographies.
My interests in studying tango are primarily about the music. In that regard, I agree with Julián, and I wonder to what extent there can be a similar understanding of tango between a native of Buenos Aires (with tango culture, which is increasingly scarce) and a person from China, for example. Of course, I am also interested in the lyrics and ultimately in the dance. But I understand that internationally, the greatest interest is in the dance, which can be adopted by people in many ways, as there is an old tradition of adapting the dance to each country where it has been reterritorialized. I agree with Pablo: all versions of tango contribute to the global tango, and we need to read all the international studies (although there are few on music). And I like Anahí’s idea of building a tango capital fueled by collective knowledge.
Hi all, sorry for looking on so belatedly. There are lots of fascinating issues under discussion here. I agree of course that tango in Buenos Aires is distinct from tango as it appears in international competitions or in local versions across the globe (Finland, China, etc). But I am really interested in understanding the historical production of that difference. Tango was deeply transnational at its inception, but it became so deeply linked to porteño authenticity that it became difficult to remember or to hear its global roots. I think it is enlightening to explore that process. Looking forward to the conversation.
As someone who lives in a region where only a small tango community exists, I can’t imagine working on tango without trying to learn from international perspectives on the art form. And as someone who began my research on tango during a global pandemic when travel was not possible, my access to these perspectives has been primarily through online resources, particularly through video posts of dance performances of various types. In chapter 7 of her book, Spinning Mambo into Salsa: Caribbean Dance in Global Commerce, dance scholar Juliet McMains discusses how the internet has both facilitated the sharing of different styles of salsa from around the world and led to new hybridized styles of dance and music: “The Web has remade global commerce, and the salsa dance industry which was born along with it was fundamentally shaped and enabled by a new hyperlinked world where people can market and distribute their products to niche communities at speeds never before imagined.” She examines “how the Web facilitated globalization of salsa dance commerce, putting regional salsa styles into contact, contention, and collaboration,” “how the Internet-facilitated blending of regional salsa styles into a new hybrid ‘congress-style’ salsa,” and argues “that the use of Internet technology was consistent with the way earlier technologies such as records, radio, and television helped to hybridize Latin dance, but that the Internet accelerated the process” (McMains 2015, 261). I can imagine that tango dance and musical practices may have undergone similar processes as salsa, but I don’t want to assume that this is necessarily the case (I can think of some reasons why it might not be analogous). I’ll be curious to hear what others might think about this.
Very quickly – since travel/nostalgia are essential to the tango in terms of both content (lyrics) and form (affects of yearning in musical scores), international perspectives on the form seem inevitable and necessary.
Lots to discuss with the other questions but since I am so late, I’ll leave it there for now!