Insider-outsider phenomenon in traditional dance research in indigenous communities

Kibirige, Ronald (2015) Insider-outsider phenomenon in traditional dance research in indigenous communities. Acta Ethnographica Hungarica, 60 (1). pp. 17-23. ISSN 1216-9803

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Abstract

Scholarly research in the field of traditional dance¹ has been carried out under the umbrella of cultural studies that have been ignored in all academic circles in the East African states of Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, and Rwanda. Until the late 1960s, there was no distinguished academic institution in the East African region that offered studies in dance. Although traditional dance plays a pivotal role in the execution of the day-to-day activities in many East African communities, less effort has been put into its development in form of research from within the region. Much of its sources today create concern due, but not limited only, to their scarcity, but also to the fact that outsiders from the dance traditions in question mostly author them, thereby creating a perennial outsider-researcher phenomenon. In this paper, I reflect on two traditional dance research experiences; In Transylvania — Romania in October 2013, and a comparatively longer experience of folk dancing in the different rural communities of Uganda in a quest to further understand the practical results of a field research in traditional dance that is rather dominated by dance researchers from outside that dance culture, and the influence of such research results to the bearers of the dance tradition.

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