Salsa and Its Transnational Moves

(Paperback)

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Salsa and Its Transnational Moves presents a brilliant critical analysis of salsa dancing in a major North American city. Drawing from a vast number of disciplines, author Sheenagh Pietrobruno focuses on the tension between the status of dance as a bodily expression of identity and its function as a cultural commodity within the economic life of modern day cities. This engaging work investigates the transnational movements of salsa by exploring the circulation of salsa within the Montreal dance scene, nourished by the continuous flow of a people, and examining the commodification of the Latino culture. Pietrobruno's analysis is singular in highlighting how the migration of a people and a dance represent displacements that are not always homologous. At the core of this work, Pietrobruno offers an extensive and intricate ethnography of the institutions and individuals involved in shaping the Montreal salsa scene that will appeal to academics and general audiences alike, who are interested in the study of anthropology, popular music, dance, gender, ethnicity, and culture.

Reviews

This splendid book captures salsa dancing as both a global phenomenon, carried throughout the world by migrants and media technologies, and as a local practice, rooted deeply in the distinct cultures of different cities. Pietrobruno deftly combines richethnographic observation with a well-researched account of salsa's origins, development and ongoing transformations. The book moves towards a compelling engagement with dance's place in a world of digital communications and within what Pietrobruno callsvirtual migrations. This is a genuinely interdisciplinary book, one which will interest scholars of dance, diasporic cultural practice, media and popular music... -- William Straw, James McGill Professor of Urban Media Studies, McGill University

This splendid book captures salsa dancing as both a global phenomenon, carried throughout the world by migrants and media
technologies, and as a local practice, rooted deeply in the distinct cultures of different cities. Pietrobruno deftly combines rich
ethnographic observation with a well-researched account of salsa's origins, development and ongoing transformations. The book moves towards a compelling engagement with dance's place in a world of digital communications and within what Pietrobruno calls "virtual migrations." This is a genuinely interdisciplinary book, one which will interest scholars of dance, diasporic cultural practice, media and popular music.

Author Bio

Sheenagh Pietrobruno is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at Goldsmiths College, University of London.