Performance Geographies from Slave Ship to Ghetto
- 8 May 2008
- journal article
- research article
- Published by SAGE Publications in Space and Culture
- Vol. 11 (4) , 343-360
Abstract
Performance geography is an integral and unexplored dimension of cultural studies and cultural geography. it expands the definitions of cultural geography and performance studies to include the way people, living in particular locations, give those locations identity through performance practices. In explaining this concept, the paper expands data gathered over twelve years' participation and later, research on Jamaica's Dancehall performance, and analyzes its applicability to other Black Atlantic performance genres. Essentially, analyzing Dancehall's macro- and micro-spatialities, spatial categories, philosophies and systems were revealed, thereby delineating what this author identifies as performance geography. It is the explanation of performance geography within old and new Black performance practices such as the Blues, and especially in urban ghettoes, as in Kingston's Dancehall and South Africa's Kwaito that occupies this paper.Keywords
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