Dancing the feminine : gender and identity performances by Indonesian migrant women / Monika Swasti Winarnita.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Winarnita, Monika Swasti, author.

Series:

Sussex library of Asian and Asian American studies

The Sussex library of Asian and Asian American studies

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Indonesians--Australia--Social conditions.

Indonesians.

Women immigrants--Australia--Social conditions.

Women immigrants.

Dance and transnationalism--Indonesia.

Dance and transnationalism.

Dance and transnationalism--Australia.

Women dancers--Australia--Social conditions.

Women dancers.

Emigration and immigration.

Social aspects.

Social conditions.

Australia--Emigration and immigration--Social aspects.

Australia.

Indonesia--Emigration and immigration--Social aspects.

Indonesia.

Physical Description:

xi, 192 pages, 4 unnumbered pages of plates : color illustrations ; 24 cm.

Place of Publication:

Brighton ; Chicago ; Toronto : Sussex Academic Press, 2016.

Summary:

"Migration makes a profound impression on identity (gender and sexuality, culture, class, status), its expressions, and performance. Research in this field has demonstrated that migrant communities often cast women as bearers of cultural reproduction. This is especially the case when women choose to become representatives of their community through cultural dance performances. Such performances are also a means to express the migrant life of movement and a way to maintain their sense of well-being. Dancing the Feminine is a compelling vision of expressions of gender and identity at the heart of the Asian women's experience. For the Indonesian female migrants, performing 'femininity' is frequently negotiated in a cross-cultural context. The performances that author Monika Winarnita analyses are dramas of human interaction brought up through fissures and resolutions between the performers and their various audiences. The book provides analysis of these cultural performances as rituals of belonging, which demonstrate that in the diaspora meanings of the ritual are always open to being contested"-- Provided by publisher.

Contents:

Introducing Indonesian migrant women performance

Methodology

Intersection of literature: marriage migration and migrants' cultural performance

Perth, Western Australia: fieldwork location among the migrant community

Research on Indonesian-Australians and their intercultural relationships

Catcalling older dancers who are performing a feminine dance

Ethnomusicology of Indonesians in Australia and Indonesian women performers

Chapter outline

Politics and poetics of authenticity in cultural representation

Meeting the housewives' dance group at the Indonesian community event

Literature on authenticity in the cultural performance of dance

Unity in diversity: an inauthentic "created" Indonesian national dance

Gaining status through photos with the Premier of Western Australia

From embarrassing to empowering performance, femininity negotiated in a duel for recognition

The Indonesian bazaar

Losing face (malu) with an "amateur" performance

The state as status

Markers of status through valued criteria of performance

Ageing dancers, diminished sexuality and masculine performance

Exploring transnational sexualities

Devaluing feminine performances as transnational politics of culture

Masculine roles: shaking up transnational gender and sexuality ideals

Negotiating transnational sexuality and rejecting the negative bar girl image

Performing Chinese-Indonesian belonging in the diaspora, transnationally and translocally

Performing belonging as a Chinese-Indonesian

Diasporic belonging

Transnational belonging

Translocal belonging

Gendered forms of belonging

Why belong to a nation as a persecuted minority?

Ritual or modern spectacle? How to represent exotic Bali to potential tourists

Ramayana as national ritual celebrating Indonesian Independence Day

Ramayana as ritual out of place in Australian multicultural festivals

The three dancers' individual narratives in creating the modern Ramayana

Conclusion: moving together, audience participation and reception at the end of the show

Revelations in the disjunctures as told through ethnographic stories

Discourses of femininity, relation to "authenticity" and audience expectations

Locating the findings in the broader literature.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 164-180) and index.

ISBN:

9781845196936

1845196937

OCLC:

909777130