This study aims to investigate how dance teachers who are educated in Swedish folk dance are reflecting and thinking over the body and the use of bodily self-awareness in their teaching. Furthermore it wants to examine whether the use of somatic principles can act as a tool to support the ideas which dance teachers express. Four folk dance teachers have been interviewed as qualitative empirical material. These interviews have been transcribed and analyzed using codes and categories. The result of the study provides an image of the body as it is seen in folk dance today and points out similarities between that picture and somatics. Folk dance and somatics treat the whole body as a single unit and strive towards a relaxed and functional way of moving. Since folk dance and somatics have these similarities the possibility of using somatic principles in folk dance, such as training to gain consciousness of the body and its different parts to be able to relax actively, is discussed. However the result of this study shows how a rather small part of folk dance teachers think, since it only provides the opinions of four different teachers.

Dreaming Tracks was chosen for the title of this history because of its reference to the journeys and routes taken by the ancestral founders of each of the extended family clans. As they travelled they recorded the events and situations they encountered along the way , which they left in story, painting, song lines and dances for the future survival of their people. The history of the Aboriginal/Islander Skills Development Scheme also pertains to a journey. This journey records the events that brought about the establishment of the longest surviving, urban Indigenous dance organization. It's a voyage that identifies the obstacles and accomplishments of its founding members, who dedicated themselves to the hard work to ensure the continuum of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander dance. It was their dream, to have an Australian Black Dance Company that would create a link between past and present, traditional and urban. The pathways they created equipped urban Indigenous Australians with a unique dance identity of their own, and established the path to continued contact with the traditional owners. Dreaming Tracks is contemporary Dreaming lore that begins with the contention for land rights in the early 1970's and follows the progress of the Aboriginal/Islander Skills Development Scheme to the end of the decade. It records the desires, dreams and conflicts that brought this organization into being. In parallel, the concerns of the founder, Carole Y. Johnson, sets the path for the journey, which by the end of the twentieth-century witnessed the establishment of an accredited dance course, two dance companies (The Aboriginal/Islander Dance Theatre and Bangarra Dance Theatre, Australia) and students who are key participants in the artistic design of the 2000 Olympics in Sydney Australia / Master of Arts (Hons) (Performance)

This dissertation is an ethnographic expository of how Tavirima Traditional Dance Group uses chinyambera traditional dance as a copying mechanism for marginalised communities in Gweru, Zimbabwe. This study contextualises and analyses how Tavirima’s performances of chinyambera reflect the socio-political environment in Zimbabwe and how the music works to bring about social change. It gives further insight into and analysis of how traditional songs metaphorically speak out against the authoritarian government of Zimbabwe led by Robert Gabriel Mugabe, and how dance embodies dissent against the same. The dissertation provides transcriptions and contextual interpretations of chinyambera songs which Tavirima uses as agents for social change focusing on how the songs reflect, contest, resist and mediate in the prevailing socio-political crisis in Zimbabwe. The research also discusses how chinyambera’s roots, expressiveness and energies influence Tavirima to choose the dance over a myriad of other Zimbabwean traditional dances. The theoretical framework for this study is underlined by the African Popular Culture Theory, Alternative Cultural Theory and Positive Deviance Approach creating a vantage point through which the study is framed to analyse the ability of popular arts in bringing about social change and how subalterns take charge of their destiny by defying restrictive and oppressing systems through a metamorphosis of traditional music and dance.

Kasi ya vijana katika kukuza muziki wa kizazi kipya katika kipindi cha utandawazi haiendani na kasi ya ukuzaji wa ngoma za asili. Mpaka sasa haujafanyika utafiti wa kina kuhusu kuzuka kwa tabia hii. Makala haya yanatumia mahojiano na vikundi vya ngoma vitatu halikadhalika wanamuziki wa kizazi kipya kuweka bayana chanzo cha tatizo. Aidha, makala haya yanatumia nadharia ya utendaji kama darubini kuchunguza matatizo ya kijamii, kisiasa, kiuchumi na kiutamaduni yanayowakumba vijana na namna yanavyochochea mfumuko wa tabia hii mpya. Utafiti huu umegundua kwamba uhaba wa mianya ya kiuchumi na kisiasa kwa vijana, nafasi ya ngoma za asili katika jamii ya sasa, mahusiano hasi kati ya vijana na wazee katika kuuendeleza utamaduni pamoja na vijana kutaka maendeleo ya haraka kuwa ndio chimbuko la tatizo.

Kasi ya vijana katika kukuza muziki wa kizazi kipya katika kipindi cha utandawazi haiendani na kasi ya ukuzaji wa ngoma za asili. Mpaka sasa haujafanyika utafiti wa kina kuhusu kuzuka kwa tabia hii. Makala haya yanatumia mahojiano na vikundi vya ngoma vitatu halikadhalika wanamuziki wa kizazi kipya kuweka bayana chanzo cha tatizo. Aidha, makala haya yanatumia nadharia ya utendaji kama darubini kuchunguza matatizo ya kijamii, kisiasa, kiuchumi na kiutamaduni yanayowakumba vijana na namna yanavyochochea mfumuko wa tabia hii mpya. Utafiti huu umegundua kwamba uhaba wa mianya ya kiuchumi na kisiasa kwa vijana, nafasi ya ngoma za asili katika jamii ya sasa, mahusiano hasi kati ya vijana na wazee katika kuuendeleza utamaduni pamoja na vijana kutaka maendeleo ya haraka kuwa ndio chimbuko la tatizo.

Text in English / This case study of the Caravan Traditional Dance group profiles Musisinyani Mackson Mavunda‘s contribution to Tsonga music and dance performing arts. The lack of documentation of the work of Tsonga local traditional composers and choreographers is well-known in South Africa. This is echoed by Kidula (2006: 109), stating that ‗many studies from the continent have few outlets in the global academy, inasmuch as the work done by foreign researchers is barely known in much of Africa‘. A few years in the future, it will not be known who the composer of a certain song was, and what their intentions were in composing that particular song. Naturally the composers want to send a message to the community and sometimes to entertain the community or compose for a certain ritual. Composers need a considerable amount of planning and carefully chosen words, choreography and so on and this becomes apparent when taking into account the time and effort they put into composing a song. In response to this problem and by placing the composers‘ narratives at the centre, the study examines the role of the founder of the Caravan Traditional Dance group (CTD), Musisinyani Mackson Mavunda, and his contribution to Tsonga music and dance performing arts. This requires a critical examination of all aspects of his CTD professional career: his musical beginnings, teaching career, teaching of Tsonga traditional dances and his social and cultural heritage in the society. The key finding of this study was that Musisinyani distinguishes the humanity of others, which is Ubuntu philosophy. Music is power. It has power from within the composer. This is seen through the composer‘s confidence, assertiveness and motivation when composing songs. Music has the power to do; this is the listeners‘ choice. Through the power of music, people can gain skills; they may be productive and can network and be innovative. Music also has power over people, and the power to influence communities, thereby helping unite community members to work towards a common cause to achieve a common goal. It therefore gives communities strength and cohesion. As the community they have the power to challenge the status quo and to encourage one another. / Art History, Visual Arts and Musicology / M.Mus.

Text in English / This case study of the Caravan Traditional Dance group profiles Musisinyani Mackson Mavunda‘s contribution to Tsonga music and dance performing arts. The lack of documentation of the work of Tsonga local traditional composers and choreographers is well-known in South Africa. This is echoed by Kidula (2006: 109), stating that ‗many studies from the continent have few outlets in the global academy, inasmuch as the work done by foreign researchers is barely known in much of Africa‘. A few years in the future, it will not be known who the composer of a certain song was, and what their intentions were in composing that particular song. Naturally the composers want to send a message to the community and sometimes to entertain the community or compose for a certain ritual. Composers need a considerable amount of planning and carefully chosen words, choreography and so on and this becomes apparent when taking into account the time and effort they put into composing a song. In response to this problem and by placing the composers‘ narratives at the centre, the study examines the role of the founder of the Caravan Traditional Dance group (CTD), Musisinyani Mackson Mavunda, and his contribution to Tsonga music and dance performing arts. This requires a critical examination of all aspects of his CTD professional career: his musical beginnings, teaching career, teaching of Tsonga traditional dances and his social and cultural heritage in the society. The key finding of this study was that Musisinyani distinguishes the humanity of others, which is Ubuntu philosophy. Music is power. It has power from within the composer. This is seen through the composer‘s confidence, assertiveness and motivation when composing songs. Music has the power to do; this is the listeners‘ choice. Through the power of music, people can gain skills; they may be productive and can network and be innovative. Music also has power over people, and the power to influence communities, thereby helping unite community members to work towards a common cause to achieve a common goal. It therefore gives communities strength and cohesion. As the community they have the power to challenge the status quo and to encourage one another. / Art History, Visual Arts and Musicology / M. Mus. (Musicology)