ICTM Talk #6 : Andriy Nahachewsky - Dance from Ukraine

Andriy Nahachewsky is an ethnographer and researcher specialized in Ukrainian dance in Ukraine, Canada and nine other diaspora communities. Professor and “Huculak Chair Emeritus” at the University of Alberta in Canada, he is active in the ethnochoreology group of the ICTM. Since the Russian invasion of Ukraine, he emphasizes the need to raise awareness on Ukrainian culture today.

During this session, he will offer a multimodal introduction to Ukrainian dance, identifying its different cultural contexts and traditional forms. He will expose the contrast between participative dance and presentation dance. The first is dominated by a brief communication between the dancers and centered on their experience as a process. Introductory dances are mainly aimed at an uninitiated audience and are considered more of a product than a process. This continuum is key to understanding the relationship between traditional dance (and music) and renewed movement, manifesting in diverse ways across cultures.

In a friendly atmosphere, seated around the tables of the foyer (bar area) of Molière, the ICTM Talks are a cycle of lessons on six different musical traditions and the culture from which they come. Each of the sessions will be devoted to a different style of music, the repertoire and the territory associated with it, and presented by specialists from the world of the arts, academia or enthusiasts of the music style in question.