tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8391868415283911957.post8314818842636072786..comments2014-04-23T17:56:54.401-07:00Comments on Pândegas: International Ballroom Samba VS Brazilian Samba: Why are brazilians so intolerant towards foreign expressions of Samba.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8391868415283911957.post-65091163667272652302014-01-25T17:43:26.605-08:002014-01-25T17:43:26.605-08:00Great input. I think you are right. But its good t...Great input. I think you are right. But its good to notice also that we Brazzilians are not against the creation of versions of samba dance. There is nothing wrong with that. The problem is that a version assumes some degree of fidelity or similarity, and international style has almost none. If musicians and dancers from Japan or Sweeden start to listen, study and feel the spirit of samba and later making their own interpretation, changing it to a new style, brazilians would be happy to call it samba, or japanese-samba, sweedish-samba, etc. Change is wellcome in all art expressions. Unfortunately, thats not what happened in international-style samba. These dancer do not come from any samba tradition. Most of them do not care if its playing samba or calypso. It is plain and simple a mistake and semantic misunderstanding.lucashttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04915428052161540590noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8391868415283911957.post-738607685749415772014-01-24T06:17:40.118-08:002014-01-24T06:17:40.118-08:00Very interesting article.
There is one point thou...Very interesting article.<br /><br />There is one point though that I think is very important, and which you have not mentioned very clearly and which probably explains the anger Brazilians feel.<br /><br />In popular culture outside of Brazil, the notion of "samba" is intimately connected and has almost become synonymous with the country Brazil itself (together with football maybe).<br /><br />It is Brazil's most important cultural trademark. And calling a dance "samba" which is so unrelated to real samba, amounts to not only to hijacking the name of one of Brazil's dances but to hijacking Brazil's MOST IMPORTANT CULTURAL TRADEMARK.<br /><br />I do not think Americans would be happy if for example samba rock was sold internationally outside of the U.S. as "rock'n'roll" and bossa nova as"jazz".<br /><br />Moreover European and American influence in the world's popular culture is huge, so this misrepresentation in Europe and the U.S. has important consequences in the world as a whole.<br /><br />And now the most important point: What happens when you remove and disassociate the original real Brazilian samba dancing, music and rhythm from the word "samba", as is done in international ballroom samba? When you minimise the importance of the real Brazilian music and dance? What image of "samba" will be left, which wil be seen as uniquely Brazilian by foreigners? The answer is very simple: Almost-naked women during carnival! This is the definition for uniquely Brazilian samba, which remains in the public consciousness.<br /><br />Does Brazil's most important cultural trademark want to be, not only associated to BUT DEFINED AS almost-naked women during carnival? Most Brazilians do not want this and that is were the anger comes from.<br /><br />This is although exactly what happens: Watch an extract from "Strictly come dancing": http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=03aJ8qOqo2Q<br />(It is almost a message: We dance samba here in Europe as well, but the real Brazilian way to do it, is with almost-naked women.)Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12898085232253902380noreply@blogger.com