The Butoh Body Performed Thesis Sunyalbany Department Asian Languages And Civilizations J Brad Breiten by J. Brad Breiten instant download after payment.

ABSTRACT

The Butoh Body Performed: Aesthetic and embodiment in butoh dance

Written by J. Brad Breiten (M.A., Department of Asian Languages and Civilizations)

Supervised by Dr. Janice Brown

The Japanese dance style of butoh provides a rich co-mingling of traditional

Japanese dance movements with a new cultural and artistic expression developed in

the post-war avant-garde period. The focus of this project will be an analysis of the

intersection of this post-war aesthetic with theories of dance and movement in

butoh in order to more fully understand the role of the dancer as a vessel for

embodying meaning in performance and the role of the body in butoh dance to

communicate cultural and emotional meaning. By examining the writings of butoh

originators, this project explores the various elements of an original butoh aesthetic

and examines that performance aesthetic in its relation to forging an emotional

connection with its audience. By drawing on concepts and approaches from the

fields of kinesics and phenomenology, this project explains the human capacity to

embody meaning, how this is achieved, and how that relates to the communicative

goals of butoh performance as laid out by originators of the dance. The project

concludes by examining the intersection of aesthetic ideals with theories of human

movement and embodiment in an analysis of the recent performance Earth Tomes:

celebrating the earth.