Cultural Appropriation and Cultural Theft

 

About Jill Biden’s Christmas tap dancers: I love tap dancing. These guys were pretty mediocre, and made up for lack of footwork by dramatics, flailing and props. Which is against the aesthetics of tap dancing, which is supposed to be elegant and understated, looking effortless. The actual taps also did not seem to correspond to the dancing: they seem to have been overdubbed, hiding any flaws in the actual dancing. But what really offended me was the website of the troupe, which made tap dancing out to be a uniquely “black” or “African American” art form.

This is what real cultural appropriation looks like: not just taking and imitating the best from another culture, which is simply how civilization progresses, but lifting something from someone else’s culture, then claiming it is yours without attribution.

It seems obvious to me that “tap dancing” is the American variant of Irish stepdancing, not much further from the original stem nor more unique than Ottawa Valley stepdancing, or Quebecois or Metis clog dance. Even in America, it is not especially identified with blacks. The Radio City Music Hall Rockettes have always don tap dance; Gene Kelly and James Cagney, both Irish-American, were among the greatest tap dancers; as were Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers.

Yes, there have been great black tap dancers. But can anyone share a video of some traditional dance form in Africa that looks anything like tap dancing?

For purposes of comparison:

The Zaoli Dance from the Ivory Coast bears some resemblance to the footwork of tap or step dance---but it was invented in 1950. The influence probably came from Hollywood to Africa here, not the other way around. Interestingly, one of the dancers seems to perform in whiteface.