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Paper short abstract:

This paper examines the changes in music and dance movements of Awa Odori, a traditional folk dance (O-bon dance) in Japan, through media discourse, videos from the 1950s to 1990s, and field research, focusing on incorporation and exclusion of foreign performances such as mambo and marching band.

Paper long abstract:

Scholars are interested in adaptation of imported cultures in forming traditional culture (Hobsbawm et al. 1992; Honda et al. 2001;　Koizumi 2004). The present paper examines the changes in music and dance movements of Awa Odori, a traditional folk dance (O-bon dance) in Japan, focusing on incorporation and exclusion of foreign music, on dance movements, and on formation. Few previous papers on Japanese folk dances include this perspective. This original research encompasses events over a long time period (1920s-1980s) by building on investigations of media discourse and videos from the 1950s to 1990s and field research from 2013 to 2017.

This paper specifically considers the processes of acceptance and exclusion of foreign elements by examining the relationships between the conception of the values embedded in national and local tourism policies in each era. Examples of foreign music and dances that were found to affect Awa Odori include foreign music in the 1920-30s, mambo in the 1950-60s, and twist, monkey dance, and rock music in the 1960-70s. In the 1980s, however, dancers actively started incorporating precise formations into Awa Odori. The leader for the incorporation of formation was a well-known female nimble dancer. She was inspired by watching the formations of marching bands on television. She also refined the dance movements of female dancers to express sharpness from her jazz dance experiences. This paper further examines the incorporation process of foreign music and dances in Awa Odori according to criteria proposed by Koizumi Tetsunori (2004), namely four forms of cultural transmission such as imposition, persuasion, borrowing, and amalgamation. The presenter claims that basic simple rhythm shared by music played by traditional Japanese instruments and simple nucleus of dance movements, and sense of longing for western music and dances successfully make contemporary Awa Odori amalgamated dance.

This paper concludes by suggesting that contemporary Awa Odori incorporates foreign elements to make it attractive to Japanese audiences who are more familiar with foreign dances than traditional ones, while maintaining traditional Japaneseness in its presentation.