Title: Women’s Pre-Performance Ritual
General Information about Item:
- Customary Folklore: Ritual, Tradition
- English
- USA
Informant Data:
- Dami Apoeso is 21 years old and was born in Hartford Connecticut. He grew up in the Bronx, New York City and currently lives in Spring Valley, New York. He is majoring in computer science. He danced for approximately 6 years in a summer camp before joining Sheba his sophomore year at Dartmouth.
Contextual Data:
- Social Context
All female members of the team who are dancing in the performance participate in this ritual. The ritual occurs before every performance. The informant believes this tradition has been going on for a few years and the earliest occurrence of it that he knows of it is from 3 years ago.
- Cultural Context
Sheba is a close knit team and this ritual helps the female members spend time and bond with each other.
Item:
All female members of the team get ready for performances together. To elaborate, they do their makeup, hair and get dressed in a room together and spend the time talking, and bonding with each other.
Associated file (a video, audio, or image file):
Transcript of Associated File:
“So usually the day of the show the guys normally just get ready by themselves, but the girls, they uh they tend to like go to some girls room and get ready together and do their makeup together and I don’t even know what goes on in there but i know that they’ve been doing this for as long as they’ve been on the team. Especially like the 18s, I know Emily said that the 18s used to always get ready together, the girls and they still do to this day.”
Informant’s Comments:
The informant believes this tradition has really helped the female members of the team bond with each other.
Collector’s Comments:
This is a ritual that is similar to one in other groups and emphasizes that many performance groups strive to be inclusive and act as second families. Many traditions and rituals for performance groups seem to focus on creating a strong bond between members.
Collector’s Name: Marcus Reid
Compiled/Analyzed by: Sruthi Pasupuleti
Tags/Keywords:
- Dance
- Team
- Tradition
- Ritual
- Pre-Performance