Assumption Festival • Enlarge image People in Cuzco celebrate the Assumption Festival on August 15 every year. Gathering at the image of Santa Maria, people in colorful Peruvian folk costumes and in a variety of masks dance through the town center and along the stone-paved streets. This collaboration seems 1 Inti Raymi Festival • Enlarge image The whole city of Cuzco comes to life during the week leading up to Inti Raymi. There are parades of celebration, performances by musicians in traditional ethnic costume, and dancing. There is different entertainment on each day. On this day, primary and junior high school boys and girls performed old-fashioned dances that have been passed from generation to generation since ancient times. Around the central square, filled with sightseers, young boys and girls in various ethnic costumes of blue, red, and white perform lively dances. If I say that this week is more enjoyable than the actual Inti Raymi itself, I might offend some people. 2 http://www.boliviacontact.com/en/sugerencia/carnaval/kullawada.php The return of the Pachacuti Incas The Inca dance has been asserted itself with originality, despite the incongruencies applied to the costumes, such as the mixing of Tihuanacu culture icons with the classical terraced sign of the Inca nobility. However it is interesting to observe closely the old "wanka" (tragedy - telling) of this dance, told in Quechua and Spanish and possibly presented since 1871. On Sunday Carnival, under a splendid Inti (Sun) the sons of the sun do a recall of the "Tragedy of the end of Atahuallpa". As Jesus Lara stated, this expression does not show "any interest in adjusting to the historic reality". On his turn, the ethno-historian watched states that with this dance it is looked for a return of a happy scatological Pachacuti. The Trauma of the Conquest The dance, in fact, describes the trauma of the conquest; previous encounters, an intelligible dialog, death of Atahuallpa and victory of Pizarro and then an unexpected end sentence of Pizarro in Spain, a malediction of the Europeans and a messianic. And rebellic message of the defeated people. After the conquest, for the indigenousness, the Spaniards are the ones who caused the rupture of the economical and cosmological equilibrium of the Inca State. The idea that the arrival of the "auqasunk'akuna" (atrange foreign people) would also mean the destructuration an "Upside down World", it would promote in the multitude unconscious mind and the myth of the hope of a new age in which the times of the Inca would regenerate. The destructuration had happened but not the total destruction. It is interesting to see the coexistence of two ways of thinking, that of the Spaniard and of the indigenous, in which two ways of understanding vis a vis history are held. Myth is the first try that people do to explain the world and his place in it. The people create it and speak it out. In the case of the telling of the Incas, the acted "Wuanca" and the myth have founded on the speech to subside up to this day. Without a writing of their own: The Incas did not have a writing system of their own and this is the reason why the sources were written by priests, Spanish colonists and Conquistadors. The voice and speech were the only means by which this vision would pass from generation to generation. According to the myth of Inkarri, after the conquest, the Inca turns into an under ground being and he prevails in the "uk'u"Pacha (the world below). The millennium will arrive when he will have left his kingdom to assert his power in "kay pacha" (the world over here). The Catholic Church be settled in the power said that the virtual practices were "idolatries" and it organized a religious repression. Watched suggests that the conquest was an aggression and that it caused a trauma in the multitude mentality, which survives in the dance of the Incas, because it is re-performed as a way of violent aculturization or the struggle against oppression from the indigenous side. The progressive actualization of the myth of the "Return of the Inca's associated in the Andean towns, to other triumphant phenomena of the peasant movement. Therefore, there survives the looking forward to another Pachacuti, of turning this world to another reality, to a Pachacuti that, according to the myth, suggests a transformation and not a mere change. May be the fiction is finished, the rest is history. 3 Pre-Columbian Dance Forms The Mexican Folkloric Dance Company's opening has always been related to the magnificent Mexica (meh shee kah) culture, known as the Aztecs. Ritual dance was an integral part of pre-Columbian religion. Dances were choreographed to reflect the four cardinal points or the movement of stars. It was also believed that, because dance and music were gifts from the gods, the gods wanted men to honor them by dancing and singing. Foot stomping was believed to fertilize the soil just like raindrops do, so dancing was vigorous. both men and women danced but they never danced with each other. The concept of social dance was introduced with the arrival of the Spaniards in 1519. MFDC's dance repertoire includes several dance suites that reflect this momentous period: • La Primera Evolución - 1982 • Cuadro Náhuatl - 1983 • Ritual dedicado al Sol - 1986 • Los Concheros - 1990 • Suite Pre-Colombina - 1997 4 http://www.calacademy.org/research/anthropology/tap/ARCHIVE/2005/2005. html (two pages) Aztec Dances In Pre-Hispanic times, Central Mexico was one of many cacao-growing areas of Mesoamerica, and the Aztecs used bitter chocolate drinks in many of their ritual ceremonies. To mark the opening of the Academy's new exhibit Chocolate, Ernesto Hernandez Olmos and the Xaguia Gura Ensemble perform Aztec Indian dances that pay homage to the ancient Nahuatl-speaking cultures of Pre-Columbian Mexico. Wearing colorful outfits, masks, and spectacular plumed headdresses inspired by the feathered serpent god Quetzalcoatl, the dancers move to the rhythm of indigenous instruments such as ankle rattles, hollowed log drums, conch shell trumpets, bamboo flutes, and clay whistles -- many designed to imitate the sounds of nature. (June 11, 2005) PHOTO: June Anderson The Mayan Gift of Chocolate In a program especially for kids, Zoe Harris focuses on the role of chocolate in Mayan culture. You will hear the story of how Two Wind Deer and his monkey brought chocolate to his people, and learn about the Cacao God and how to write the Mayan glyph for cacao, as well as sing a chocolate chant in Spanish. You can take home a coloring book about chocolate and taste a delicious Mexican chocolate drink. (June 18, 2005) 5 Dia de los Muertos (November 5, 2005) Many Central American countries celebrate Dia de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) on November 1st. It is a time to remember and honor deceased relatives, with visits to the cemeteries and the making of home altars. The Academy presents a day of programs that highlight Day of the Dead customs. Acrylic painting by Ernesto Hernandez Olmos Pan de Muerto Pan de muerto is a traditional bread baked especially for Day of the Dead in Mexico. Often, the bread is formed into skull and skeleton shapes and placed on home altars (called ofrendas) to welcome back the spirits of deceased family members. Come and sample pan de muerto, served with Mexican hot chocolate. (November 5, 2005) Pre-Columbian Dance Wearing colorful feathered headdresses and ceremonial regalia, the Grupo Xaguia ensemble performs ancient Pre-Hispanic dances associated with death in Aztec times. (November 5, 2005) Offerings to the Dead Members of the audience will participate in the construction of a typical Day of the Dead altar (ofrenda). Help us assemble the altar with customary foods and offerings, including the traditional zempoalxochitl flowers -- marigolds known in Mexico as "flowers of the dead." (November 5, 2005) Mascaras Mexican artist Ruben Guzman will explain the art of papel picado (paper-cutting) -- a form of decoration popular for Day of the Dead festivities and other Mexican observances. Make your own papel picado mask to take home. Supplies provided. (November 5, 2005) 6 Pre-Columbian Maya dance From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Jump to: navigation, search In pre-Columbian Maya civilization, ritual dance had great importance. However, since dance is a transient art, it is inherently difficult for archeologists to find and evaluate evidence of its role. There is little material information left behind, beyond a few paintings on murals and vases. This poverty of facts causes a wide range of interpretions by different archeologists. Dance was a central component of social, religious, and political endeavors for the ancient Maya. The entire community danced, including kings, nobles, and common people. Dance served many functions such as creating sacred space, closing the gap between here and the otherworld, and releasing the dead from the grasp of the Xibalbans. Contents • 1 Research • 2 Technique • 3 Overview • 4 Meanings within dances Research In 1966, Micheal Coe and Elizabeth Benson recognized the depiction of important lords standing with one heel raised was indicative of dancing. Even after this pose meaning was identified, most of the examples were either dismissed or not understood in the larger context of Maya history and religion. In the spring of 1990, Nikolai Grube deciphered the glyph for “dance” (read as ak’ot) in Maya hieroglyphics. After this decipherment, it was clear that dance was one of the public actions most often depicted by Maya court artisans. The many representations of dancing people in the artwork show that the Maya kings and their courts were public performers.