This thesis uses the theory of abjection to understand differentiations in non-heterosexual identity performances in two distinct spaces - the 2005 Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras (SGLMG) parade and its associated press coverage, and latrinalia (graffiti found inside public toilets). At the same time, this thesis also presents evidence for a new concept of neo-normativity, where the stereotypical is normalised, both internally and externally, and actively reproduced. Neo-normativity, in turn, succeeds in explaining the many abjected relationships that between non-heterosexual communities and the stereotypical and quintessentialised performances. At the 2005 SGLMG parade such quintessentialised (or neo-normalised) performances were treated with both contempt - for being stereotypical and narrowly representative of the very diversity of non-heterosexual communities - as well as a tool for attracting commercial sponsorships which have growingly become an integral part to the continued survival of the annual parade. On a different level, another expression of abject was also revealed when these neo-normalised performances are persistently criticised by academics, news reporting and official photography for being stereotypical and non-representative which in itself are both a recognition as well as an ejection of the non-normative aspects of non-heterosexualities. Such an expression of abject was also evident in latrinalia found in several public toilet facilities throughout Greater Sydney were the interplay of desire and ejection were played out in a more covert manner, all the while highlighting the marginality of non-heterosexualities in these presumably heteronormative spaces. This application of abject theory emphasises neo-normative performances as permanently peripheral, a marginality of which makes these performances (and identities) intrinsically Queer.

This thesis uses the theory of abjection to understand differentiations in non-heterosexual identity performances in two distinct spaces - the 2005 Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras (SGLMG) parade and its associated press coverage, and latrinalia (graffiti found inside public toilets). At the same time, this thesis also presents evidence for a new concept of neo-normativity, where the stereotypical is normalised, both internally and externally, and actively reproduced. Neo-normativity, in turn, succeeds in explaining the many abjected relationships that between non-heterosexual communities and the stereotypical and quintessentialised performances. At the 2005 SGLMG parade such quintessentialised (or neo-normalised) performances were treated with both contempt - for being stereotypical and narrowly representative of the very diversity of non-heterosexual communities - as well as a tool for attracting commercial sponsorships which have growingly become an integral part to the continued survival of the annual parade. On a different level, another expression of abject was also revealed when these neo-normalised performances are persistently criticised by academics, news reporting and official photography for being stereotypical and non-representative which in itself are both a recognition as well as an ejection of the non-normative aspects of non-heterosexualities. Such an expression of abject was also evident in latrinalia found in several public toilet facilities throughout Greater Sydney were the interplay of desire and ejection were played out in a more covert manner, all the while highlighting the marginality of non-heterosexualities in these presumably heteronormative spaces. This application of abject theory emphasises neo-normative performances as permanently peripheral, a marginality of which makes these performances (and identities) intrinsically Queer.

In 1979, New Orleans’ Mardi Gras celebration was disrupted by a police strike. The strike exposed the new political positioning that had resulted from national pressures such as the realization of black political power and the brief surge in public worker unions. New Orleans’ weakening white social elite was forced to assert its remaining power through Mardi Gras, while finding an unexpected ally in Mayor Ernest N. Morial, the first black mayor of New Orleans. This temporary alliance exemplifies an experience that was different than that of other American cities. While strong racial tension persisted, the old establishment’s interests coincided with Mayor Morial’s when Mardi Gras, a powerful cultural and economic institution, was threatened. This temporary alliance managed to defeat the local police union by galvanizing the citizens of the city against the strikers.

What is happening on the dance floor at the gay and lesbian dance parties? What are lesbians and gay men doing when they dance? This thesis presents a project in performance research that takes as its locus on investigation the dance parties that have been produced annually by gay and lesbian organisations in Sydney since the early 1980s. In particular, it focuses on the largest of these dance parties, Mardi Gras Party and Sleaze Ball, during a period of research from 1994 to 1998. Harnessing these resources, the thesis aims at investigating how dance parties sustain an ongoing salience for gay men and lesbians in Sydney. On the basis of ethnographic research, performance documentation, and movement analysis, the investigation pursues an analytical trajectory across the making of dance parties within a subcultural scene, to the doing of dance parties as performance events, and then onto the dance floor as a site for performative practice. Responding to a persistent debate about straights at the parties, the anlayses register the salience of dancing as an etiquette of doing dance party as it is done, as a queer kinaesthesia sustained on the dance floor, and as an occasional community danced into existence. The thesis attests to the pertinence of analysing movement. It analyses the mobility of practice, rather than its textual residue; the kinaesthesia of performative identities, rather than their morphological contours; and the choregraphy of community, rather than its substantive contents. Recognising that queer theory too has an interest in movement, in proliferating metaphors for the mobility of queer identifications and desires, the thesis argues in conclusion that such metaphors represent imaginative flights of fancy to the extent that they fail to grasp the corporeality of queer kinaesthesia / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

In my thesis, I examine the racial history of New Orleans, Louisiana, through the lens of Mardi Gras. After the introduction, I begin with the history of the celebration and its European origin, in chapter two. Then, I move onto the discovery of New Orleans. In chapter three I look at the 1811 slave rebellion in New Orleans, which was the largest in United States' history. In chapter four I explore race and Mardi Gras in the nineteenth century, and the same in chapter five, but in the twentieth century. In chapter six I look at the twenty-first century in New Orleans, and Hurricane Katrina, in particular. In sum, I argue that the practice of Mardi Gras and the existence of racial conflict both separate and unite the New Orleanian community, producing the attitude and identity of the “New Orleanian.”

The Mardi Gras Indian culture of New Orleans, Louisiana is a unique tradition that blends African spirituality, Caribbean spirituality, African music and dance, with Native American style dress. The Mardi Gras Indians engage in ritual battle and ancestor worship as a part of their tradition of using cultural expression as a means for social protest. While many tourists to the Crescent City may have the opportunity to witness the Indians in full dress, even few native New Orleanians ever learn the depth of the phenomenon. / text

N/A / Thesis / Master of Arts (MA)

No description available.

Samba drumming and dance traditions work in New Orleans in ways that they do not elsewhere. Casa Samba, a drumming and dance troupe in the tradition of the Brazilian escolas de samba, shows how it works. Integral to this analysis of Casa Samba are the ways in which the group's identity and the identities of its individual members are processual, mutable, and "unfinished, always being remade" (Gilroy 1993:xi). This thesis examines how Casa Samba has situated itself in the New Orleans music scene. This work seeks, through ethnographic interviews with long term members, to identify what makes Casa Samba attractive to New Orleanians who choose to join this musical troupe as opposed to the myriad of other musical organizations available. Finally, this thesis looks at Casa Samba's post-Katrina rebirth and the ways in which the group's willingness to continuously evolve throughout its history has made this rebirth possible.

All over the world, Carnival is a time for a break in human activities, and inversion of the usual hierarchies. In New Orleans, Carnival is a time when the powerless take over the streets, and, for a time, invert control and ownership. One of the New Orleans carnival organizations are the Mardi Gras Indians, groups of African Americans who dress as Indians during the day and take over the streets of their neighborhoods, showing their power and beauty in a breathtaking display of costumes, music and dance. The Masking of the Mardi Gras Indian is a tradition dating back to at least the early nineteenth century. The Creole Wild West were the first named Indian tribe on record in 1884 but this does not mean they were the only or earliest tribe to mask. In the beginning some gangs would get together on Mardi Gras but did not mask under a proper name. The Mardi Gras Indian practice is a practice rooted in resistance to white oppression and African Americans’ demands for inclusion in the city’s Mardi Gras celebrations. The history of Mardi Gras Indians in New Orleans is not limited to the East Bank of the Mississippi River but is also includes residents on the West Bank, specifically in the neighborhood of Algiers. Within the Algiers neighborhood there are several different sections. Probably the most well known section, Algiers Point, consisted of mostly white residents. The Oakdale area, later known as the Fischer Housing Development, and the Cut-Off, an area that borders the bayous of Plaquemines Parish consisted of mostly African Americans. Although the origins of Indians masking on both sides of the River is a point of debate among scholars, some evidence suggests that Indians from Algiers masked as early as the early twentieth century. This thesis is an examination of the longest-running tribe in Algiers, the Mohawk Hunters who started out in the Oakdale area but currently most of their members now reside in the Cut-Off area. Using archival material as well as recently conducted oral histories, it explores the relationship between the Algiers Indian tradition and the more well-known groups on the East Bank. By their deep attachment to their neighborhood, despite its separation from the rest of New Orleans by the Mississippi River, they have helped to strengthen the Mardi Gras Indians’ neighborhood-bound traditions of community service and youth education. Not many people are privy to some of the information that was passed along to me through the oral interviews conducted but my personal connection to some the Mohawk Hunters, including my cousin Charles “Cubby” Dillon, possibly allowed me to gain a deeper look into the organization. I was able to use text messages for follow-up questions and this was access most interviewers may not have had. Although few residents on the East Bank know of their existence, they are a model of the community-engaged, twenty-first century Mardi Gras Indians.