One challenge many a colony or kingdom faced at the moment it became a sovereign nation-state was the construction of a national identity to which its citizenry could relate. This challenge was compounded by the reality that the citizenry of most new nations was diverse in ethnic identities–communities of people articulated by a shared language, heritage, place of origin, religion, and lifeways. Distinctive practices of expressive culture, including music making, are a part–arguably a core component–of these ethnic identities.<\/p>\n
One strategy pursued by many newly established nation-states during the twentieth century was to use the emotion-laden performing arts as media through which a shared sense of national identity could be felt. Typically, a branch of the newly-formed government–a ministry of culture, education, information, sports (or some combination of these domains)–was given the charge to create national troupes of performers consisting of, initially, non-professionals under the directorship of individuals who had, at least in part, been educated abroad (usually in the country of the former colonial power). Foreign consultants were sometimes hired to assist the local directors in shaping the new troupes’ repertoire, costuming, choreographies and stage manner. These constructions of national music, national dances, and national theatre seldom started from scratch. Existing traditions (often associated with ethnic identities and lifeways found within the country) were selected and transformed–sometimes, extinct traditions were resurrected–into works that could be successfully presented on the concert hall or theatre stage in front of a seated audience.<\/p>\n
Such orchestrations of traditional resources\u00a0(stories, dance styles, musical practices, costuming, and rituals) become canonized as emblems of a nation’s identity and reinforced as such through state-run media broadcasting and presentation at prominent political events. This canon of works is often transmitted outside the immediate organization of its origin through educational programs at government-sponsored institutions (such as institutes of the arts and teacher training colleges) as well as at private schools founded by former members of state troupes. A product\u00a0of this transmission process is the creation of a pool of talented and professional performers trained to perform a repertoire of items suitable for presentation to foreign audiences. Such a talent pool is drawn upon by tourism promoters in their endeavors to present to tourists cultural material of a local nature that has been domesticated for cosmopolitan consumption.<\/p>\n
For case studies that illustrate the above generalizations, see the suggested readings below.<\/p>\n
Suggested Readings:<\/strong><\/p>\n Castaldi, Francesca. Choreographies of African Identities: N\u00e9gritude, Dance, and the National Ballet of Senegal<\/em>. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2006.<\/p>\n Hagedorn, Katherine. Divine Utterances: The Performance of Afro-Cuban Santer\u2019a<\/em>. Washington and London: Smithsonian Institution Press, 2001.<\/p>\n Lau, Frederick. “Packaging Identity Through Sound: Tourist Performances in Contemporary China.” Journal of Musicological Research<\/em> 17 (1998): 113-134.<\/p>\n Miller, Terry E., and Sean Williams. “The Impact of Modernization on Traditional Musics.” The Garland Encyclopedia of World Music, v.4: Southeast Asia<\/em>. New York: Garland Publishing, Inc., 1998. 113-143.<\/p>\n \u00d3 Briain, Lon\u00e1n. “Minorities Onstage: Cultural Tourism, Cosmopolitanism, and Social Harmony in Northwestern Vietnam.”\u00a0Asian Music<\/em> 45\/2 (2014): 32-57.<\/p>\n Reed, Susan. Dance and the Nation: Performance, Ritual, and Politics in Sri Lanka<\/em>. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 2009.<\/p>\n Rice, Timothy. May It Fill Your Soul: Experiencing Bulgarian Music<\/em>. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1994.<\/p>\n Sarkissian, Margaret. D’Albuquerque’s Children: Performing Traditions in Malaysia’s Portuguese Settlement<\/em>. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2000.<\/p>\n Turino, Thomas. Nationalists, Cosmopolitans, and Popular Music in Zimbabwe<\/em>. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2000.<\/p>\n >><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" One challenge many a colony or kingdom faced at the moment it became a sovereign nation-state was the construction of a national identity to which its citizenry could relate. This challenge was compounded by the reality that the citizenry of most new nations was diverse in ethnic identities–communities of people articulated by a shared language, … Continue reading “The Traditional Arts and the Process of Nation Building”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-menu-items"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vetter.sites.grinnell.edu\/tourism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vetter.sites.grinnell.edu\/tourism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vetter.sites.grinnell.edu\/tourism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vetter.sites.grinnell.edu\/tourism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vetter.sites.grinnell.edu\/tourism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/vetter.sites.grinnell.edu\/tourism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":316,"href":"https:\/\/vetter.sites.grinnell.edu\/tourism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12\/revisions\/316"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vetter.sites.grinnell.edu\/tourism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vetter.sites.grinnell.edu\/tourism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vetter.sites.grinnell.edu\/tourism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}