Abstract
Sayaw ng Pagbati (Greeting Dance) is a street dance performed by Catholic girls during Easter. When COVID-19 hit the Philippines in 2020, the performance was cancelled. With this situation, fieldwork is forced to ask: How does a researcher make use of field notes in time of the pandemic? What reflections on difficulties of doing fieldwork make sense when the actual performance is absent? This study revisited the following methodologies: a) meaning of the movement through bodily memories, b) invaluable use of “moments” to provide access to trace developments, and c) analysis of visual history and ethnohistory. The computer’s ability to store, search, retrieve, and distribute vast amounts of information, allows for new ways to document and link information. What such an approach enables is the contextualization of data. In the time where the dance is absent, digital media served as a bridge to fill a missing space for this cultural event.
Presenters
Chazeline Caberos BautistaStudent, MA Theatre Studies, University of the Philippines Diliman, Metro Manila, Philippines
Details
Presentation Type
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session
Theme
2024 Special Focus—Traveling Concepts: The Transfer and Translation of Ideas in the Humanities
KEYWORDS
DANCE, CULTURAL PERFORMANCE, FIELDWORK, DIGITAL ETHNOGRAPHY
