Conference: Société Internationale d’Ethnologie et de Folklore (SIEF) 2023

Co-Conveners: Dr. Monica Mottin and Dr. Barbara Curda (UCA (université Clermont Auvergne), France, IFP (Institut Français de Pondichéry), India)

Panel Abstract: We are living in unprecedented times of crisis, uncertainty and swift social changes. Performance, be it dance, theatre, music or other live events that cross boundaries often embodies and reflects such changes. In fact, performance is intrinsically inconstant - as Marcia B. Siegel pointed out, "dance exists at the perpetual vanishing point" [and is] "an event that disappears in the very act of materialising" (1968).

Documenting performance-based cultural heritage, despite it being by nature aleatory and impermanent is crucial as it connects communities and places to their history and identity; its erasure impacts on communities’ sense of belonging and resilience. But then, what does it mean to document performance? What does it mean to document heritage performance in an age saturated by social media? For whom do we document and how? Who should document?

Performance documentation as such is an activity related to multiple uncertainties. Documenting performance may differ according to the purpose of documentation, e.g. whether the focus is placed on aesthetics, on body movements, on social relationships. Furthermore, documentation is by necessity a socially and culturally situated act that is dependent on the perception of the person who is documenting. Therefore, documentation is also a creative act. Reconstructing a performance necessarily involves recreation and improvisation that contribute to the re-creation, re-shaping and re-birth of cultural heritage.

We invite papers that engage critically with the challenges of documenting performance-based cultural heritage. We welcome both theoretical and ethnographic studies from any geographical region.

As part of this panel, Dr. Mottin will present her paper “Dancing gods and dancing phones: Heritage performance documentation and social media in Nepal”