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Border Crossings: Exile and American Modern Dance — Comprehensive Notes

  • Border Crossings: Exile and American Modern Dance presents a bi-coastal, cross-disciplinary examination of how exile, diaspora, war, and social injustice shaped 20th-century American modern dance. It argues that crossing borders—physical, geographic, racial, national, artistic, spiritual—becomes a defining feature and DNA of modern dance.
  • Central concept: exilic modernism. Exile, statelessness, and diaspora are not anomalies but generators of choreographic language, political consciousness, and aesthetic innovation. The book distinguishes exile (a political/legal condition) from diaspora (a broader, often non-returnable displacement), yet emphasizes their interconnection in dancing bodies and artistic practices.
  • The volume’s aims: reframe modern dance history by centering exiled and marginalized artists, illuminate how geopolitical events produced new choreographic forms, and treat dance as a site of sanctuary, resistance, and memory. It also treats dance as ethical inquiry and a vehicle for social justice.
  • Core theoretical framework:
    • Exilic modernism: a philosophy/critique of modern dance through statelessness, diaspora, and exile. ext{Exilic Modernism}
      ightarrow ext{statelessness}, ext{diaspora}, ext{exile}.
    • Diaspora: movement, migration, and separation from homeland; implies no guaranteed right of return.
    • Bodily focus: the modern dancing body as a site of border crossings and political ecology; performance spaces become everyday spaces, linking choreography to immigration laws and racial cartographies.
    • Racial cartography: SanSan Kwan describes a political and social topography in the U.S. marked by racial borders that map space, law, and social accessibility for people of color.
  • Key themes across the essays:
    • Bodies of War: exilic corporeality appears as gesture, movement, and storytelling to raise consciousness about war trauma, displacement, and humanitarian crises.
    • Choreographies of Encounter: Pueblo and Indigenous/Indo-Hispano rituals (Los Matachines, Los Comanchitos) and intercultural exchange reframe border-crossing as ritual performance across North America.
    • Black Modernism and Jazz Modernism: early modern dance draws on African diasporic forms (Cakewalk, Juba, Buck ’n Wing) to create a modernist Black body on stage; Walker’s Black Salome and the shift of Black aesthetics into mainstream modern dance are highlighted as foundational.
    • Proletarian Steps and Radical Dance: the 1930s-40s labor movement integrates dance with politics (Workers Dance League, Red Dancers), using dance to translate Marxist/Leftist ideals to broader audiences; the stage becomes a political forum for poverty, labor rights, and anti-fascism.
    • Crossing racial borders: collaborations and intersections among artists of color—Dudley, Primus, De Lavallade, Holder, Hinkson, Fort, Collins, Ailey, Maracci—are presented as pathways for democratic, interracial modern dance praxis.
    • The cartography of internment and exile in the U.S.: Japanese American internment (Executive Order 9066, 1942) and related wartime policies intersect with dance histories, creating a distinct exilic lens on dancers like Sono Osato, Yuriko, Michio Ito, and Isamu Noguchi.
    • Global solidarities and transnational exchanges: Shankar (Labour and Machinery) and other international figures connect U.S. modern dance to anti-colonial, labor, and diaspora movements worldwide.
  • Important historical contexts and dates (selected):
    • World War II and related internment: Executive Order 9066, 1942; approximately 112,000 Japanese Americans forcibly relocated; internment camps in the Southwest and desert regions; impact on dancers Sono Osato, Yuriko Amemiya Kikuchi, and Isamu Noguchi.
    • Spanish Civil War and the Popular Front era (1930s-1940s): international solidarity through dance; Katherine Dunham’s Trilogy of the Spanish Earth (1937); anti-Fascist performances and refugee artists’ political mobilization.
    • The Great Depression era (1930s) and the rise of radical left dance groups in New York: Red Dancers, Workers Dance League, and New Dance Group, integrating Marxist/socialist sensibilities into modern dance.
    • Early Jazz Modernism (1920s-1930s): Aida Overton Walker, Adelaide Hall, Florence Mills, Josephine Baker, and others redefining Black modernist aesthetics; Walker’s Black Salome as a landmark synthesis of Black vernacular movement with modern form.
    • Postwar era and Civil Rights precursors (1940s-1950s): interracial performance opportunities (92nd Street Y) and the emergence of Black-led modern dance companies; Mary Hinkson’s role in Wisconsin’s first interracial modern dance company (Wisconsin Dance Group, 1947–1951).
  • Definitions and key terms (from the Introduction and Exile/Diaspora sections):
    • Border Crossings: physical, geographic, racial, national, artistic, political, spiritual, and psychic crossings; a historical condition shaped by war and discrimination.
    • Exile: a singular, crucial intervention in which statelessness and diaspora inform modern dance’s forms and narratives.
    • Diaspora: displacement with possible no right of return, mobility and transfer, shaping modernist movement languages.
    • Bodies of War: exilic corporeality as a core modality of modern dance in response to geopolitical conflict.
    • Racial Cartography: a framework describing how racialized borders shape space, access, and representation in dance and society.
    • Corporeal Orature: movement aligned with speech; embodied narrative as historical consciousness (Thomas F. DeFrantz).
  • Notable artists and representative works (illustrative, not exhaustive):
    • José Limón: mestizo consciousness; fled the Mexican Revolution via Nogales; dances anchored in Latin/x identity and fluid borders between Mexican Folklorico, Flamenco, and bullfight gestures (zapateado, la corrida).
    • Pearl Primus: Trinidad-born, raised in NYC; educated via Leftist New Dance Group; focused on racial injustice and social witness; key works include Negro Speaks of Rivers (1944) and African Ceremonial (1944), and Strange Fruit (1943) addressing lynching. Doctorate in Anthropology (NYU, 1978).
    • Aida Overton Walker: early Black modernist; Black Salome (1912) reinterprets Salome with Black vernacular movement, arguing for authentic Black folk material and distancing from blackface/minstrelsy; seen as a precursor to later Black modernism.
    • Eras and groups: Edith Segal’s Red Dancers (1930s) and Revolutionary Dance; Anna Sokolow’s Dance Unit (interracial performance spaces at 92Y); Workers Dance League; New Dance Group; Katherine Dunham’s Southland (1951) and civil rights protest works; Uday Shankar’s Labour and Machinery (global labor critique).
    • Carmen De Lavallade and Alvin Ailey: childhood ties to Lester Horton’s studio; cross-border and cross-cultural collaboration; exemplars of resistance within White-dominated spaces; Ailey’s later impact on American modern dance.
    • Carmela Lita Maracci (spelled Carma Lita Maracci in some sources): a boundary-crossing dancer-teacher who fused Flamenco, Spanish dance, and classical ballet with modern dance; considered a political performer; advocated open-access studios as laboratories for exiled and migrant artists.
    • Yuriko Amemiya Kikuchi (Yuriko): Martha Graham Company member; interned during WWII; later performed “Thin Cry” at 92nd Street Y; examined in Mana Hayakawa’s analysis for Japanese American memory and advocacy.
    • Sono Osato: Nisei dancer with ABT; interned during WWII; later performed and faced travel restrictions due to exclusion zones; connected to Isamu Noguchi and his set designs.
    • Isamu Noguchi: artist/designer whose work intersected with modern dance (e.g., Ruth Page collaborations) and the postwar cultural diaspora.
    • Uday Shankar: Indian modernist whose dance sought to critique class and labor through social realism; influenced by workers’ movements; expanded intercultural exchange in dance.
    • Catherine/Allison Burroughs and Edith Segal: collaborators in radical labor-oriented dance; introduced Black/White worker solidarity performances and revolutions on stage.
  • Structural and ethical implications highlighted:
    • The book argues for a redefinition of modern dance that centers statelessness and diaspora as core conditions of modernity, rather than mere background factors.
    • Exilic bodies resist archival silencing and white-centric narratives; their “exilic corporeality” renders visible the costs and urgencies of exile, war, and racism.
    • The rise of interracial performance spaces (e.g., 92nd Street Y) and cross-racial collaborations in the 1930s-40s marks a political frontier in American dance making and reception.
    • The tension between liberation and assimilation: dance offered empowerment and autonomy yet frequently operated within white-dominated cultural spaces and racial hierarchies.
    • The wartime period intensifies cross-border exchanges: artists flee Francoist Spain, Nazi-occupied Europe, or internal U.S. segregation; many contribute to a transnational anti-fascist cultural front.
  • Methodologies and cross-references:
    • The book integrates historical documentation (photos and captions like Fig. 1.1–1.21) with critical essays, performance studies, and diaspora theorizing.
    • It anchors arguments in established scholarship (Hartman on inequality, Kwan on geographic racial cartography, DeFrantz on corporeal orature, Ortíz on Tewa space, etc.).
    • The essays draw on biographical and archival sources (Jerome Robbins Dance Division, NYPL; ABT and other company histories; university archives).
  • Outcomes and takeaways for understanding modern dance:
    • The modern dance canon is deeply shaped by exile, migration, and political resistance; these forces propelled innovation across technique, aesthetics, and subject matter.
    • Choreography becomes a vehicle for documenting, contesting, and transforming sociopolitical realities; the stage acts as both sanctuary and site of critique.
    • The histories of dance are inseparable from broader global histories of migration, empire, fascism, civil rights, and labor movements; cross-border connections foster a transnational modernism.
  • Enduring questions raised: how do border crossings redefine what counts as “American” modern dance? how do exilic artists reframe the ethics and aesthetics of performance in times of crisis? and how can archival memory be mobilized to sustain social justice in the present?
  • Notable concluding reflections: modern dance was born at borders; the exilic experience lives in the archive of the body; dance is a form of memory and a tool for political action that anticipates contemporary concerns about race, immigration, and human rights.
  • Supplemental context and catalog notes (from the Notes in the book):
    • The project is a bi-coastal exhibition and public programming initiative (New York Public Library and University of California, Santa Barbara).
    • The notes cite broader scholarly references on exile, diaspora, border studies, and labor movements; they map the interconnections among art, politics, and history.
  • Key visual and textual cues referenced: figures and captions (e.g., Fig. 1.2, Fig. 1.3, etc.) illustrate cross-border and cross-cultural dance histories, including the works and identities of Limón, Primus, Walker, Sokolow, Dudley, Maracci, Fort, Osato, Noguchi, and Shankar.
  • Overall takeaway: Border Crossing is both a history and a methodology—an insistence that exilic and diasporic experiences are essential to understanding the evolution of American modern dance and its ongoing relevance to cultural justice and global exchange.