Ballet as Ethnic Dance
During my sophomore year of college, I studied with Patricia Beaman as a part of her World Dance Cultures course. She posed the question to our class of if ballet should be considered an ethnic form of dance. Here, you will find my musings on the subject.
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Ballet is undeniably an ethnic form of dance, but there comes a point where ballet cannot be categorized as one large dance style. It must be acknowledged that ballet has an extraordinary reach in the contemporary world, seeping through borders into countries across the globe, but there comes a point where more localized cultural styles and aesthetic preferences of a specific time must be taken into account when considering what makes up the large category of ballet. If dances of ethnic groups cannot be all grouped together, such as the dance styles of the North American Indian Tribes, then is it fair to group together all of the ballet forms that are found across the world?
The style of ballet dances adopted for Igor Stravinsky’s original staging of Rite of Spring is by no means the same as that which the Ballets Russes, who relocated to Paris, would utilize in their rendition of Swan Lake, and yet these two dance styles are found merely across town from each other at virtually the same time in the 20th century. Just as North American Indian dance styles cannot be grouped together, whether time period, location, or peoples be the deciding factor, ballet falls into a similar position. Ballet, in whatever form it takes now, had its roots in the court of King Louis XIV, but as time continued and this style expanded, it began to change and morph. That being said, is there a certain threshold it has crossed where it can no longer be considered ballet? Are there areas where it borders on being “contemporary” in nature?
Ballet is ethnic in how it changes and evolves, even in subtle ways. It is not a separate category of dance to be held in divine light, remaining steadfast and immune to change, nor should it be used as a standard with which to judge other dance forms. Ballet does not serve as a baseline, and it is not where the beginnings of dance come from. Arguably, ballet is not one form, but the umbrella term for many forms which have been influenced by the communities it inhabits. By those means, it is unjust to allow this form to surpass others in value and have it glorified, even by western scholars specializing in its study, as a form by which to contrast and measure all other forms. There is validity in comparing dance forms all around the world to each other, to understand their cultural relevance or substance among a community, however, this juxtaposition is not strictly meant for styles to be held up to a westernized, ballet-centric standard. Ballet is not a measuring stick. Ballet, in and of itself, is an ethnic dance form sculpted by cultural elements and continues to adapt, begging the question of whether it has adapted in such an extreme way to create new forms of dance.
