Rader 1

Josette Rader

Dr. Giddens

World Religions REL1300

19 March 2023

The Transformation & Appropriation of Ritual Tribal Dance Concerning Systemic Racism;

This is America

The purpose of dance in tribal religions broadly speaking, is to serve as a form of worship

or prayer. Predating any known record keeping, dance has served people all over the world as a

way to preserve and pass on the oral traditions, myths, and customs of a populous. Historically,

colonization of an area and its people demanded the substitution and supplantation of the local

customs and culture, the deepest roots belonging to religion. In areas of white colonization,

religious missionaries strove to quell or eradicate tribal dance as a step toward conversion and

purification of the local people through pietistic governance. Tribal dance in the face of white

colonization and subjugation hence became used as a conduit for expression of rebellion and

emotional freedom where actual freedom is obstructed. Dance has not been omitted from these

attempts to convert and control indigenous populations as they mutated into institutionalized,

interpersonal, structural and internalized racism vitiating all aspects of society. Youth took on

active roles in the rebellious expression through dance. Influenced by original tribal movements

and purposes, these dances are still seen today as inconsequential by the professional and

institutional world of dance and even shocking, vulgar, or lascivious by those participating in

systemic racism. Racism has been the main determinant of tribal dance’s characterization as a

less refined and unimportant artform, concurrently appropriating and diluting those same dance
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elements to manufacture respectably white dance by relegating those that originated from people

of color to entertainment only and gatekeeping any overlap into artistry.

Components of tribal dances are wide-ranging and difficult for anyone who has never

encountered them to identify independent of their original source. For the purpose of efficiency

and authenticity, videos providing examples of each dance will be referenced throughout this

paper, the list of which is included in the notes. It is recommended that the reader views each as

they are referenced, rather than altogether at the end.

Although the purposes dance serves vary from tribe to tribe and by geography, it is often

an inveterate religious expression and is still used today to exalt in the cultures and rich histories

of many ethnic peoples. Elders pass on the pride in that culture to each subsequent generation

through their ritual dances. For Indigenous North American religions (NAR), dance serves

primarily as a form of worship, a way for the tribe to connect with the Great Spirit of the earth.

Using dance, NAR could express victory, thanks, commune with the spirits of ancestors, sharing

oral histories and healing. Dance is essential for celebrations and to harmonize the people of that

tribe with the spirit of the earth.

In Polynesian tribes, dance provides a connection to the ancestry of a community through

the telling of creation myths. In the Hawai’ian islands, hula is used to reach the haili moe, a

dream state balancing between the conscious and unconscious mind (Primal). Hula also serves as

an exhibition of male strength and muscle control. Often a chief of a tribe would select warriors

from the male dancers of the hula1 (Telling). The siva afi of Samoa shows a warrior’s prowess

and serves as an outlet for individual expression within the community. Dance in Samoa is also a

manifestation of societal rank and activities of daily life.

Africa is no exception to the diversity of tribal dance, each region developing their own

unique dances that generally fall into ritual, ceremonial, and storytelling categories. In African

culture, dance is still used to socialize, celebrate festivals, teach community members, and to

lend spiritual or religious purposes at funerals, births, and weddings. Throughout times of

oppression, tribal dance is a form of communication, expression and freedom. The Ghost Dance

in Indigenous NAR and the cake walk dancing in slave owning plantations in the American

south are famous examples of this wielding of dance as a societal tool (Kurath). A culture’s

belief system is bolstered and affirmed through ritual dance. For people whose way of life is

indissoluble from their spirituality and religious experience, dance facilitates the most powerful

expression. It is the poetry of the people.

For those who are not accustomed to the particularities of dance, a quick characterization

of tribal dance ensemble, posture, and movements is obligatory. An overarching theme of tribal

dance is the symbolism of dress and props. All religious tribal dance has associated clothing

pieces. However, their use, composition, and meaning are as varied across cultures as the dances

themselves. Some we still see today are the grass skirts and plant-based adornments used in

various Hawai’ian hula,2 Tahitian otea,3 Māori haka,4 and African zaouli and chakacha.5 Use of

Bright colors and prominent textures are also seen throughout tribal dance all over the world. In

cases like haka and siva afi6, facial or body paint simulating traditional tattoos are used. In

zaouli7, artful masks are donned representative of the spirit invoked. Elaborate headdresses are

prevalent in otea, zaouli, and NAR grass dance8. Many tribal dances are marked by props such as

flaming knives, club weapons, sticks, and hoops which are integral to the story or purpose of the

dance being performed.

Because the purposes of tribal dance are multifarious, their associating movements are

just as diverse, even when only viewed through the lens of religious significance. Even so, tribal

stylized movements are easy to spot with some previous exposure. Characteristics of Indigenous

NAR dancers are flat-footed stamp or toe-heel manipulation, often forward-tilted or alternating

posture, raising of the knee, and alternating muscular relaxation and restraint during gesticulation

(Kurath).

Māori haka and Samoan siva afi movements are rhythmic, with strong feeling. They may

include swaying, striking of the thighs and chest, stomping and gesturing with stylized violence.

Often haka and siva are accompanied by chants and fierce facial expressions meant to intimidate,

such as bulging eyes and protruding tongues (Cunningham). Hawai’ian hula kahiko and Tahitian

otea dancers employ undulating gestures to instruments and chant oli, involving the sinuous

movements of limbs and hips (Britannica). Tahitian otea differentiates in the speed of the

rhythmic hip movements that more closely resemble movements used in African muwogola and

chakacha. African tribal dance can broadly be characterized by a forward inclined torso. Dances

are earth-centered with the posture and gestures usually drawing focus toward the ground.

Interpreting the musical patterns, dancers’ movements proceed through the music rather than

with it as in most dances (Picton and Harper).

The exercitation of controlling dance to restrain social liberty is far older than Kevin

Bacon and Footloose. 1883 introduced the Code of Indian Offenses laws to Indigenous NAR

culture which punished religious dance by imprisonment or withheld treaty rations (Zotigh). In

1869 the spiritual movement of peaceful resistance known as the Ghost Dance began, based on

the round dance9 common to many indigenous peoples as part of a healing dance (Wanzala-

Silva). With the propagation of European diseases across North America, the Ghost Dance
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disseminated throughout the indigenous population in hopeful response to the epidemic deaths.

In December 15, 1890 the Ghost Dance catalyzed one of the greatest tragedies in American

history resulting in the genocide of as many as 300 unarmed indigenous men, women, and

children (Wishart). In the milieu of racial intolerance of these times and the cultivated fear of the

Ghost Dance, this event was labelled a battle and the soldiers were branded heroes, receiving the

Congressional Medal of Honor (Green 200-208). Today the ethnic cleansing is called the

Wounded Knee Massacre (Wishart). It took 50 years before the American government loosened

their chokehold and removed the dance ban, but it wasn’t until 1978 that the American Indian

Religious Freedom Act was signed into law, protecting religious dance (Zotigh).

In Hawai'i, Christian missionaries converted Queen Regent Ka’ahumanu who in 1830,

banned public performances of hula. This ban was eased in 1870, though fees, fines, and

penalties were still present for performances perpetrated inside Honolulu and Lāhainā. It was not

until 1883 that King David Kalākaua revived the dance publicly (New-York). Unlike in Hawai'i,

Tahiti and the United States, Samoa’s ritual tribal dance was never outright banned. However,

many dances were discouraged by missionaries, especially dances performed in the nude or at

night poula, which Western Europeans considered indecent (Crowe et al. 99-102).

Ever the fountain of ethical choices, the United States used dance to control the

education, intercommunication, and physical appearance of its enslaved people. There were

considerable efforts by whites to discourage communicating among slaves. Many white

American slave owners barred slaves from most forms of dancing and the use of traditional

African instruments. Enslaved Africans found ways of getting around these prohibitions. For

example, since lifting the feet was often considered dancing, many plantation dances in response

included foot shuffling and strong hip and torso movement. Enslaved people conceived new
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drums and early Stepping to supplement the loss of the traditional music of their homes.

Modified styles of movement emerged to become the origin for the musical and dance forms that

eventually coalesced into tap dance (Kahlich). However, tap would not be brought into

respectability and popularity with the public until it was performed by white dancers in motion

pictures (Black History). Antithetically, as is the nature of a white supremacist mind, monitored

dancing was encouraged in slaves for economic reasons. Slaves who had been exercised looked

better and brought a higher price at auction. Slave owners and transatlantic slave traders alike

deemed exercise necessary, obliging the slaves to dance when permitted on the upper decks of

their kidnappers’ ships. Those that were reluctant or lacked the required level of exuberance,

were flogged. “Dancing the slaves” continued beyond the slave ships, permeating American

southern plantation culture as a way to force the appearance of health and contentedness upon

captive Africans (Emery).

Socially the abuse of cultural religious dancing was continued, even after laws banning

those practices were overturned or even instituted to protect them. Ted Shawn, a founder of

American modern dance noted in 1924 the common public opinion of Indigenous NAR dance

saying, “the bureaucratic mind being what it is, the dancing of the Indians is looked upon as

degrading, morally and industrially, and veiled threats in the form of letters from the Indian

Commissioner, one of which I have read, indicate an official intention to blot out such remnants

as still exist,” (Adams). Shawn later incorporated elements of Indigenous American tribal dance

into ballet as he led the modern dance movement.

New Zealand took their colonialism in different direction, choosing to appropriate Māori

dance culture for entertainment. Rather than banning the Māori people from performing ritual

dances like haka, it’s 1884 international rugby team the All Blacks began the use of a pregame
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haka to intimidate the opposing team (Bayer). Many Māori have been outspoken about the

bastardization of the haka by players who neither understand, nor cherish the culture and purpose

of the haka commenting the it is now, “the most globally recognized form of cultural

appropriation”11 (Hokowhitu). This popular abuse by sports teams fueled today’s erroneous

interpretation of haka as a war dance performed only by men. From 1955 to 1979, the University

of Auckland engineering students threw an annual “haka party” in which they ridiculed haka by

increasingly offensive dress and conduct, eventually painting male genitals on their bodies and

performing obscene gestures while wearing grass skirts. Years of this celebrated mockery

culminated in Māori and pacific islander students intervening, resulting in several students’

assaults and arrests, compelling authorities to finally put a stop to the vulgarism (Basil)(Day).

As stereotypes of tribal dance became increasingly subject to exoticism, white

Americans’ demand for displays confirming these stereotypes surged. 1920s Hawai’i realized a

rise in the tourist industry, birthing the westernized hula ‘auana or “modern hula” which was

performed with melodic songs and sensual gestures for Hollywood films and tourist shows.

Sexualization of the hula continues in modern dance. Images of women sporting traditionally

white features paired with dark hair and eyes are clad in short grass skirts, bikini tops and flower

garlands, despite the hula kahikos use as a ceremonial and religious archetype that is performed

by both men and women (Primal). A similar fate awaited Tahitian dance (Tuuhia). Samoan and

Māori tribal ritual dance endured a paralleling portrayal that ascribed hypermasculine qualities to

haka and siva afi. Brutish tattooed men contorting their faces in viciousness and ferocity lent an

intentionally savage male interpretation to cultural dances that were neither explicitly for men,

nor considered overtly masculine in practice.

Often during the 1800s, people of color in tribes were abducted into service of sideshows

and circus acts, most infamously Barnum and Bailey’s. The religious and cultural heritage of

their various tribes were exploited as oddities for money that was often withheld by their

ringmaster or manager. These exhibits of tribal dance and culture were meant to shock and

entertain as much as they were designed to reinforce the idea of eugenics and the supremacy of

whites over the “savage” or “primitive” people of color. As the 1800s persisted, Tribal dance

was gradually introduced to large audiences. Unfortunately, when these dances did appear on

stage, it was in the form of minstrel shows. Dance movements were exaggerated and most often

performed by whites in blackface as a form of mockery and with the intention of poking fun at

Black people with little understanding of their extensive and diverse cultural history of dance and

music (Mackrell). If and when Black performers were placed on stage, they were only placed in

stereotypical roles or fetishized and considered exotic in nature. This perpetuated and justified

the continued prejudice and discrimination within the socio-political structure. Most notably,

such dancing images were used to support the Jim Crow laws enacted to keep the nonwhite

population out of the political process (Mackrell).

Moving into the 20th century ballroom dances became very popular. Preferential choice

was given to those dances with agile foot work paired with minimal movement from the hips up.

Essentially the opposite of the tribal exhibitions shown as oddities, displays made popular to ogle

in the previous century. The advent of jazz led to other forms of social dance as western music

fell under the influence of post-reconstruction era music produced by the descendants of

enslaved persons. The 1920s bore rebellious dances like the Charleston, a variation of an African

step dance known as the juba or jube which was characterized by the crossing and uncrossing of

the arms over the knees. The names Juba and Jube were slave names popularly associated with
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Black dancers and musicians (Kahlich). Dances like the Charleston and Black Bottom mirrored

the syncopated rhythms, bent knees, curled torsos and pelvic movements of tribal dance. These

characteristics were continued into Lindy Hop, rock and roll, and disco (Mackrell).

Despite its reigning popularity, acceptance as an artform has circumvented jazz dance

since its conception. The majority of this condition can be accredited to the historical separation

between the artistic community and what is considered entertainment. A delineation that

parallels the separation of Black people and stage performances in the 19th century. Art’s

disassociation establishes entertainment as different and therefore less sophisticated. The

successful development of jazz as an organized and validated technique during the latter half of

the twentieth century was contingent on the obscuring or excision of any movements that do not

conform with white ideas of artistic value (Robinson). It was not until the late 20th century that

the influence of African music and dance in popular dance as well as in modern dance and ballet

was recognized. Notwithstanding, that recognition is white washed and Black involvement is

contentious to this day.

While many of these new moderns were appropriating dances from tribal cultures, their

approach grew out of a Eurocentric philosophy of art. Modern influencers, having intermittent

contact with the social uses of tribal dance, continued to evolve ballet and modern dance, which

began to merge with or develop from tribal dance elements. Dance professionals worked

collectively to create new products from these dances that could more easily be mass-produced

and commercialized in a “white is right” market. Significantly, they coded their efforts a

“refinement of ragtime” (Robinson), and legitimized their work through a veiled diatribe of

artistry and morality. Modifications wrought on the tribal-born dances imply that artistry and

morality were only realized by discarding the black connotations of ragtime and instead, produce
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a modern dance constructed by a halcyon white racial identity (Robinson). This attitude is

similarly reflected in the clothing associated with these dances. Ballroom, modern and ballet

dress are considered refined and classical while the textures patterns and colors of tribal dress are

considered garish costume, loud and uncouth; as is any state of undress associated, while the

body suits and tights of ballet and ballroom are perfectly acceptable.

Even the postures associated with tribal dance are refitted to better convey whiteness in

dance. Openness is the definition of a ballet dancer’s stance. The body is perpetually held erect,

head consistently lifted and the arms maintained apart from the body. Even when the dancer

executes fast or energetic movements, they must be contained with calm fluidity and grace. This

stance is in direct opposition to most tribal dance posture. Where ballet seeks to conceal or defy

the force of gravity and the strain of dancing, tribal dance revels in its connection to the earth.

Ballet has been the dominant genre in western dance since its development from court

dances of the 16th and 17th century. Its characteristic style of movement is based on its heritage in

French, Italian and Russian folk dance (Mackrell). The term folk dance is essentially the name

given to tribal dances of historically white Europeans. Folk dances of the United States inherited

cultural features of English, Irish, and Scottish settlers, whose features are born unmistakably in

square dances, New England longways dances and southern mountain dances (Kahlich). In

contemporary conversation the term Folk dance has been changed to traditional dance in an

attempt at a more politically correct title. Thus, further deepening the segregation and

classification of dance styles by race and ethnicity. Folk dancing is still a part of the physical

education curriculum in some grade schools. No noneurocentric dances are taught on such a

mass scale in American schools as a form of exercise, despite requiring more muscle control and

energetic movement. This suggests the criteria for the dances taught have more to do with their
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association with European dancing rather than their benefit as a form of exercise. Still, in most

academic settings today, ballet and modern dance are required to get a BFA or MFA in dance,

while all dance forms originating in cultures of color, such as tribal dances, are elective (Bouey).

All of the above brings us to the culmination of the historical politico-social engagement

with tribal dance ascribed to people of color. The popularity of tribal dance inspires the attention

and alterations of modern dancers, who appropriate those movements, transforming them into

massively marketable dances. Whether they do so by removing their cultural essence knowingly

or unknowingly, the result is the same ubiquitous movement that has lost any of its original

distinction and essence. Enter Childish Gambino’s This is America.10 There is no better example

of this vampiric draw on tribal culture to fuel viral entertainment juxtaposed with the violence

and racism those same people face in society.

Within the first 50 seconds of the song, we see a Black musician shot in the head by

Childish Gambino as he strikes a pose that mimics the illustration of the grotesquely cartooned

Black man that adorned the cover of Jim Crow propaganda. These are the very laws discussed

previously being reinforced by the appropriation and stereotyping of tribal inspired dancers and

musicians in minstrel shows. The entirety of the music video is ceaseless in its symbolism.

Gambino uses layered South African melodies in traditional choir that gives way violently to

dark Southern American Trap music. Throughout the single take video, he vacillates between

tribal dances and viral dances derived and watered down from their original tribal influences.

Erupting around himself and the happy-go-lucky dancing school children are chaos and violence.

Each act depicted is an allusion to a distinct horror from American history inflicted on people of

color. All the while, he is sporting what can only be described as a minstrel-like smile.
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There are many individual messages behind each musical, lyrical, and physical choice in

the video. Perhaps more impactful is the much broader idea that all those messages add up to. It

is our feeling of entitlement to the parts of cultures we covet for ourselves and our inability to

acknowledge the importance of treating those cultures with the reverence and exaltation they

deserve. Our entitlement and covetous comportment giving way to the transformation and

appropriation of ritual tribal dance rooted in our unchecked systemic racism. NPR Music hip-hop

journalist Rodney Carmichael best encapsulates Childish Gambino’s concept, “Either way, it is

representative of this history of violent white supremacy.” This is America.

Notes
1.
Telling Warrior Stories with Hula https://youtu.be/BFT-M18N2A4
2.
Hula: https://youtu.be/_LvGWFL2iLA
3.
Tahitian otea: https://youtu.be/_tQQDwp6Bds
4.
Māori haka: https://youtu.be/KMby1MQhJJ4
5.
African Chakacha: https://youtu.be/cp_qNkV4MW8
6.
Samoan siva afi: https://youtu.be/uvQkYyT4NnY
7.
African zaouli: https://youtu.be/suXyks-9LVg
8.
NAR grass dance: https://youtu.be/Mi7WDcCUm-Y
9.
NAR Round dance: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lIzaF4LqD3M
10.
This is America: https://youtu.be/VYOjWnS4cMY
11.
All Blacks haka: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yiKFYTFJ_kw
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