“When will we dance in French?”: Jazz, gender, and dancing French identity in the “Années Folles”
Abstract
The purpose of the present study is to investigate the world of dancing in postwar France. Our central argument is that, as a widely-embraced social practice, popular dance openly invited contemporaries to discuss the problems of modernization and changing gender relations. Most of the newer dances then in vogue found birth in American jazz. Thus, these steps were arguably the most ostentatious, initial representation of U.S. mass culture to arrive on French shores. Consequently, conceptions of French national identity were challenged. In response, numerous strategies, as well as historical precedents were called upon for adapting these newer cultural imports to indigenous definitions of taste. On lesser levels, this investigation contributes to several other bodies of scholarship: the history of leisure activities, sport, and middle- and upper-class cultural practices. Finally, an examination of popular dance provides evidence that the Great War was more of an interruption than a rupture with the past. Concerning primary sources, a wide variety of material has been consulted: archives, novels, essays, plays, poems, and magazines. Still, overarching emphasis is given throughout to the newspapers of the era.
Degree
Ph.D.
Advisors
Walton, Purdue University.
Subject Area
European history|Dance|Music
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