20 research outputs found
A Choreographic Dialogue with Caribbean Poetry: The sacredness of the feminine in Walcott's Omeros (1990)
The aim of this paper is to show how the poetry and art of Caribbean writer Derek Walcott (1930-2017) tends to manifest and substantiate the desirable cultural transformation promoted by the work of the American anthropologist and scholar Riane Eisler. The recognition and the exaltation of symbols connected to the feminine world stand at the core of Walcott\u2019s masterpiece Omeros. In a creative mutual dialogue between different genres and identities, the Caribbean author materialises Eisler\u2019s attempts to forge a type of society based on a new partnership ethic. In a second perspective, this paper analyses how Walcott\u2019s work opens the path to possible creative interdisciplinary approaches in the world of the arts. In my own contribution, as a professional dancer and choreographer, I have tried to \u201cgive voice\u201d through movements to some episodes relating to the feminine included in Omeros
A Prayer for Life: Water, Art and Spirituality in T. S. Eliotâs The Waste Land
This article reads T. S. Eliotâs The Waste Land from an âecocriticalâ (Glotfelty & Fromm 1996; Garrard 2004) and âblueâ (Hauâofa 2008; Ingersoll 2016; Mathieson 2021) or âwaterâ perspective. It focuses on Eliotâs magical and aesthetic (r)evolutions depicting the sterility and degradation of life after World War I. I focus on three episodes that mix modern expressions and arts with highly evocative and spiritual forces coming from Eliotâs American heritage and his interest in Eastern religions and philosophies. Madame Sosostrisâs reading of the âwickedâ cards becomes in this way a Modernist dance of âliquidâ archetypes. Tiresias, the prophet and true âseerâ evokes a Cubist painting while substantiating the need for fluid and more positive encounters in our life. The three-time beating refrain in the Shanti prayer epitomises the rhythm of water-dropping, the expected coming of water that will heal and re-connect humanity with the âOne lifeâ. In this âundisciplinedâ (Benozzo 2010) interpretation, I read The Waste Land as a prayer for water, a communal and âpartnershipâ (Eisler 1988; Eisler & Fry 2019) claim for regeneration and transformation, in the acknowledgement that we, humans, are just one side of the spiralling and cosmic music of the world
Reversing Midsummer: Alexander Ekmanâs Dance-Theatre Adaptation of Shakespeareâs A Midsummer Nightâs Dream
This essay focuses on Alexander Ekmanâs A Midsummer Nightâs Dream, an ambitious dance-theatre project that the renowned Swedish dancer and choreographer produced for the Royal Swedish Opera of Stockholm in 2015. Ekmanâs performance âreversesâ Shakespeareâs comedy by bringing on stage the traditional Swedish midsummer festival with its ring dances around the maypole, while mixing ballet with chants, popular rites and new technological devices. In my twofold analysis, I focus first on Ekmanâs innovative choreographic âtextureâ which, despite the choreographerâs assertion that it is completely detached from Shakespeareâs story, is in reality a close reproduction or âplayâ between reality (Act I) and dream (Act II). Second, I show how drawing from Shakespearian themes, Ekman destabilises world dominator and patriarchal views in order to embrace imaginative partnership visions of reality (Eisler 1988), which have much to say about our most intimate and concealed truths
Dance as decolonial and partnership praxis. JosĂ© LimĂłnâs The Moorâs Pavane, a ballet reworking of Shakespeareâs Othello
Drawing from the decolonial perspective (Quijano 2007; Mignolo 2012; Mignolo, Walsh 2018) and the biocultural partnership-dominator model propounded by the anthropologist and social activist Riane Eisler (1987; Eisler, Fry 2019), this essay explores The Moorâs Pavane (1949), one of the most successful dance adaptations of Shakespeareâs Othello by the Mexican-American emigree, dancer and choreographer JosĂ© LimĂłn (1908-1972). In this paper I will draw a parallel between the Bardâs text and LimĂłnâs dance composition to show how textual and embodied forms can merge and become a perfect medium for the displaying of all nuances in human ânatureâ, desires, and relations. In the world of ballet, the performance was revolutionary because it presented for the first time LimĂłnâs original technique, a complex re-working of Humphrey and Weidmanâs practices and a mixture of different dance-styles and tempos. The Pavane, a rigidly fixed court dance performed in Northern Italy around the Renaissance period, becomes the means through which LimĂłn portrays the changing of order and stability of Shakespeareâs plot, so as to debunk the hypocrisy of Elizabethan society and embody Othelloâs falling into Iagoâs trap. In my analysis, I will explore how LimĂłn transposed and decolonised the Shakespearean tragedy through highly innovative fall-recovery movements, iconic gestures, and precise geometrical patterns. I will focus in particular on LimĂłnâs choice to reduce the intricate plot to a four-hand partnership dance between two different and yet parallel couples, Othello-Desdemona and Emilia-Iago. The aim of my analysis is to show how LimĂłn slowly breaks up the Pavaneâs immutable tempo in order to provide a rhythmical crescendo of movements that express the tensions, disillusionment and final choices of the main protagonists
Dance as Decolonial and Partnership Praxis: JosĂ© LimĂłnâs The Moorâs Pavane, a ballet reworking of Shakespeareâs Othello
Drawing from the decolonial perspective (Quijano 2007; Mignolo 2012; Mignolo, Walsh 2018) and the biocultural partnership-dominator model propounded by the anthropologist and social activist Riane Eisler (1987; Eisler, Fry 2019), this essay explores The Moorâs Pavane (1949), one of the most successful dance adaptations of Shakespeareâs Othello by the Mexican-American emigree, dancer and choreographer JosĂ© LimĂłn (1908-1972). In this paper I will draw a parallel between the Bardâs text and LimĂłnâs dance composition to show how textual and embodied forms can merge and become a perfect medium for the displaying of all nuances in human ânatureâ, desires, and relations. In the world of ballet, the performance was revolutionary because it presented for the first time LimĂłnâs original technique, a complex re-working of Humphrey and Weidmanâs practices and a mixture of different dance-styles and tempos. The Pavane, a rigidly fixed court dance performed in Northern Italy around the Renaissance period, becomes the means through which LimĂłn portrays the changing of order and stability of Shakespeareâs plot, so as to debunk the hypocrisy of Elizabethan society and embody Othelloâs falling into Iagoâs trap. In my analysis, I will explore how LimĂłn transposed and decolonised the Shakespearean tragedy through highly innovative fall-recovery movements, iconic gestures, and precise geometrical patterns. I will focus in particular on LimĂłnâs choice to reduce the intricate plot to a four-hand partnership dance between two different and yet parallel couples, Othello-Desdemona and Emilia-Iago. The aim of my analysis is to show how LimĂłn slowly breaks up the Pavaneâs immutable tempo in order to provide a rhythmical crescendo of movements that express the tensions, disillusionment and final choices of the main protagonists
Empathizing with Migrants: Multimodality and Partnership in Teachersâ Professional Development
The demographics of the Mediterranean islands like Malta have changed drastically in the last 10 years mainly due to migration flows from the south and east. During the scholastic year 2018-2019, Maltese schools had a 12% non-Maltese population overall, but in some coastal areas, this meant an 80% shift to a cohort of non-Maltese students. Teachers have been abruptly faced with the need to adopt multicultural and inclusive pedagogical approaches for which they did not feel they were fully equipped. This article describes the creation of a multimodal video production aimed at filling in this gap. It is based on the Partnership Studies philosophy, proposed and expounded by the anthropologist and social activist Riane Eisler, and on the Blue Option, a cooperative and proactive approach that looks at the âseaâ as a space for encounter, understanding, and new intercultural awareness. The video has been tested with two groups of teachers in training, in order to investigate whether, and in what ways, it inspires student-teachers to express empathy with the migrants. Positive results have been extrapolated from the written reflections of the participants
Partnership Encounters in Literature(s), Poetry and Voices from Other Worlds
The academic bulk of this yearâs Blue Gum contains texts in both English and Italian. Out of fourteen articles, seven are in Italian and seven in English. They all scrutinise and illuminate a diversity of relevant literary works under the lens of the biocultural partnership-domination theory (Eisler 1987). The literary texts in this issue range from the ancient to the contemporary, from âcanonâ to post-decolonial literature, in a joyful variety of interrelated recurrences, connections and encounters. William Shakespeare, Walter Scott, Doris Lessing, Ursula Le Guin, Bram Stoker, David Malouf and Jean Rhys are just few of the many writers tackled
by our invited authors
The Whale and the Girl: a Reading of Witi Ihimaeraâs The Whale Rider from a Blue and Partnership Perspective
This paper analyses Witi Ihimaeraâs The Whale Rider (Ihimaera [1987]), one of the most renowned MÄori novels, from a twofold perspective: first, through an ecologically-oriented "blue option" (Hauâofa [2008], Ingersoll [2016], Mathieson [2021]), an exciting and provocative slant that emerged in the humanities as a framework to investigate sea literatures and cultures of the ocean, and second, through a "partnership thought" (Eisler [1988]; [1995]; [2002], Eisler - Fry [2019]), a transformational approach propounded by the social theorist and activist Riane Eisler on the urgent need to re-think relationships between individuals, communities and the environment (Riem - Thieme [2020], Riem - Hughes-dâAeth [2022]). The Whale Rider is a powerful decolonial (Quijano [2007], Mignolo [2012]) story that recounts the adventures of Kahu, the female descendent of a strict patriarchal MÄori community, who will have to re-establish not only the sacred role of women within her society but also revive the tribeâs ancestral bond with the more-than-human world (Hubbel - Ryan [2021]). In tune with the MÄori spiralling perception of life, the analysis uncovers Ihimaeraâs narrative strategies in depicting an ever shifting "tidalectic" (Brathwaite [1992]) reality in which gender boundaries, mythical genealogies and natural manifestations are re-drawn in light of a more interrelated and peaceful oceanic future. The Whale Rider presents an insightful re-writing of Western-European and Northern Atlantic postcolonial views through an alter-native and "blue" text that depicts an-Other and more ecologically sustainable partnership world
Dismantling Colonial Frontiers: The Partnership Word in Coetzee's Waiting for the Barbarians
Drawing from decolonial thinking and non-binary studies, and from Riane Eislerâs biocultural partnership-dominator approach, this paper focuses on the power of the unpredictable encounters and the dialogic wor(l)d in J. M. Coetzeeâs Waiting for the Barbarians. Whilst most postcolonial literary critique stresses the violent divisions at the core of the different stories in the novel, my analysis demonstrates how narrative, linguistic, cultural and historical boundaries are suspended in an unmarked territory in which the cycles of nature re-establish the sacred meaning of life, human consciousness and its relationship with all creations. Coetzee wittingly portrays the inconsistency of colonial frontiers in the Magistrateâs self-destabilising quest and his uncertain understanding of the âbarbarianâ systems of signs, embodied in the alien Otherness of the girl. In this sense, my analysis reads the novel as a partnership quest that reveals profound spiritual truths and dissolves the constraints of Western dominator outposts and their borders
'We going change round the carnival': decolonial narratives and partnership encounters in Derek Walcott\u2019s Drums and Colours
To celebrate the short experience of the Federal government of the West Indies in April 1958, the Caribbean writer Derek Walcott was commissioned to work on a play that would capture the shared values and cultural unity of his multifaceted community. This \u201cmassive undertaking\u201d led to the production of Drums and Colours, an epic pageant covering four hundred and fifty years of Caribbean history through the depiction of four emblematic characters linked to the Antillean archipelago: Christopher Columbus, Sir Walter Raleigh, Toussaint L\u2019Ouverture and George William Gordon. Walcott wanted to decolonise the narratives of the Western literary \u201ccanon\u201d in re-writing these characters according to a new perspective. At the same time, he presented original \u201cunknown heroes\u201d and \u201cdispossessed voices\u201d and their unpredictable encounters shaping the \u201copen\u201d hybridity and schizophrenic reality of the Caribbean. I will study how Walcott reverses the carnivalesque West Indian performance in a destabilising theatre within theatre. I will show how paintings, dances, and songs articulate the colourful rhythms of tribal drums in a creative form that unbridles conventional artistic practices, thus enriching our \u201cecosophical\u201d perception of reality