I Dancing in the Squares by Yifan Wang Department of Humanities

Dancing in the Squares by Yifan Wang Department of Humanities Duke University Date:_______________________ Approved: ___________________________ Ralph Litzinger, Supervisor ___________________________ Michael Hardt ___________________________ Diane Nelson Thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in the Department of Humanities in the Graduate School of Duke University 2015 i v ABSTRACT Dancing in the Squares by Yifan Wang Department of Humanities Duke University Date:_______________________ Approved: ___________________________ Ralph Litzinger, Supervisor ___________________________ Michael Hardt ___________________________ Diane Nelson An abstract of a thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in the Department of Chemistry in the Graduate School of Duke University 2015 Copyright by Yifan Wang 2015 Abstract “Guangchangwu,” or what is literally translated as “square-dancing,” is a form of public dance that has been exceedingly popular, albeit controversial, in China over recent years. Most of the participants are elderly women in their late-50s or above, who roughly fall in the category called “dama” (“big-mother”). Usually, a dancing group assembles in the evening and dances on a daily basis to the music played through a portable loudspeaker. Yet, because many dancing sites are in or close to residential compounds, the music played, or, the alleged “noise pollution,” have caused numerous conflicts nationwide. During the summer 2014, I conducted a three-months fieldwork on the dance in China. In this thesis, I first demonstrated how a specific guangchangwu dancing group organized in relation to the space it occupied, then I traced the media discourse of guangchangwu and showed how it became linked with elderly women, dama. I argue that this seemingly new and overwhelmingly women-dominated public dance emerges from a series of long existing activities, the embedded gender politics of which articulates China’s recent and ongoing revision of policies and laws regarding birth control and the retirement age. Moreover, it is precisely against the backdrop of such social discourse that the practice and persistence of individual dancing groups becomes meaningful: through an effective organizational structure, these elderly women made their existence visible, audible, and their stories irreducible. iv Contents Abstract .......................................................................................................................................... iv List of Figures ............................................................................................................................... vi Acknowledgements .................................................................................................................... vii 1. Introduction ............................................................................................................................... 1 2. How to dance in the Squares ................................................................................................. 10 2.1 Morning guerilla ............................................................................................................. 14 2.2 Organizing group A ....................................................................................................... 21 3. The politics of dance ............................................................................................................... 35 4. Becoming Dama ....................................................................................................................... 47 4.1 Representing guangchangwu: the “2013 turn” ............................................................ 49 4.2 The production of the linkage ...................................................................................... 58 5. Conclusion ............................................................................................................................... 63 Works Cited ................................................................................................................................. 70 v List of Figures Figure 1: Map of Yongping City ................................................................................................. 5 Figure 2: Site A Detail ................................................................................................................. 14 Figure 3: Site A1 on Weekend Mornings .................................................................................. 15 Figure 4: Organizational structure of group A. Lines are dotted to indicate that the group is only loosely associated and the division is not absolute. .................................................. 30 Figure 5: Hu Rong's graduate designing sketch. The title of the red print reads: “Value- added Tax Declaration Form (B).” Note the seam on the top. Hu taped two pieces of paper together to make a larger piece of paper to meet the size requirement. ................. 66 Figure 6: Liu Yun's sketch of the choreography drawn on a sample contract. .................. 67 Figure 7: Fan-dancing Thursday on Site A. Note the bicycles and mopeds parking on the periphery. ..................................................................................................................................... 68 vi Acknowledgements This project was initiated from the East Asian Cultural Studies class I took during the first semester of my graduate studies, which was co-instructed by Professor Leo Ching and June Hee Kwon. Their encouragement and guidance made possible my very first entry into academic research. Professor Ralph Litzinger’s mentorship since the beginning of the project fundamentally changed the way I view the dance and the world at large. The second chapter is based on the final paper for Professor Michael Hardt’s class on Leadership. Along with the series of classes I took with him, his intellectual engagement and generosity profoundly influenced me as a student and a person. I am deeply inspired by Professor Diane Nelson’s distinctive ways of thinking and being, and her passion and love of life. Moreover, I am most grateful for encountering them as great individuals even beyond their academic achievements. APSI’s generous funding largely facilitated the fieldwork during summer 2014. I would like to thank Stephen Goranson at Duke Library for patiently reading through the scratches, notes, drafts, and offering comments. This project sees the friendship with Chris Ma Jingchao, with whom talking has always been enjoyable and enlightening. I want to thank all the friends I met in my graduate studies for their intellectual and emotional support, especially my “twin” Yang Minghui, Huang Shan, Magdalena Kolodziej, Huang Sihui, Nadia-Estelle Fiat, Zhou Dihao, Chris Daley, and Zach Levine. Thanks to all my friends who have been sending vii me articles, links, and virtually everything related to guangchangwu they read over the past two years, which greatly enriched my otherwise fragmented collection. They are, Zhao Xinzhe, Huang Peiying, Sun Ning, Shi Qian, Wang Zhiyin, Zhang Zining, Wang Yuting, Hua Sha, Zhao Yue, Elisa Conterio, Yao Yao, and An Ning. I am indebted to my parents, without whose care and support this would be unimaginable. Their good reputations among the neighborhood and colleagues also smoothed the way for my fieldwork. My deepest gratitude goes to all the dancers I have encountered through this project. They show me how courageous and beautiful it can be being a woman in this world. viii 1. Introduction In 2012 I lived in Guangzhou in south China. Sharing an apartment on the 26th floor overlooking the metropolis’s old downtown, I enjoyed all its conveniences of public transport and 24-hour stores around the corner while being kept from car horns, hawkers, and all the bustle that this third largest city of mainland China teemed with. Yet, as soon as I settled down, I found myself wearing earphones every night listening to music, turning the volume up and up, with the dimmest hope to drown out the dancing music outside. Featuring strong drum beats and earworm tunes, the music from a neighboring public square penetrated into my room almost every night during my residence unless when the rain poured—a drizzle would not be a problem for the enthusiastic dancers. Annoyed that my own life was squeezed, I somehow became curious about the dance that people had been colloquially long called “guangchangwu” (广场舞). The term can be literally translated into English as “square-dancing,” named after the space where the dance usually takes place, without evoking the square dance in the American context. Even in the muggiest southern summer nights, the square was packed with people engaging in all kinds of activities, stirring the thick and unbreathable air. People of all ages seemed to have much fun playing badminton even without a net in between; some elderly wielded plastic tai chi swords and held the pose for a minute, waiting for the instructor to correct the movement. I jogged around the square, dodged the skaters, and 1 for the first time rested my eyes on the dancing group, though I already felt too familiar with what I saw. Faced toward a set of loudspeakers, it was a group of more than a hundred dancers, mostly women in colorful dresses. They danced individually to the music at a set pace, only occasionally moving beyond their own square of tile. Thus was my first personal

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