Modern Dance and Cultural-bodily Border-crossing in Modern East Asia

2023 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 19K00102
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Section: 一般
• Review Section: Basic Section 01040:History of thought-related
• Research Institution: Hitotsubashi University
• Principal Investigator: LEE Yeounsuk 一橋大学, その他部局等, 名誉教授 (00232108)
• Project Period (FY): 2019-04-01 – 2024-03-31
• Keywords: モダンダンス / 身体と近代 / 身体的越境

Outline of Final Research Achievements

By tracing the performance activities of dancer Ishii Baku, a representative dancer in modern Japan, as well as of dancer Ch’oi Sunghi, who was an Ishii’s student, the current research has explored how the border-crossing aesthetics of body was related to the dynamics of international and transnational issues in modern East Asia to 1945. The key findings of this research are twofold. (1) It is found that by examining the processes involving the introduction and reception of modern dance in Japan and in Colonial Korea, cultural hegemony was not necessarily determined by political power. (2) Through analyzing specific examples, it is also found that the modern dance of Japan and Korea was embedded in the respective “ethnic aesthetics” of their own in one manner or another and, in a similar vein, the border-crossing body was resonated with their own
“ethnic aesthetics.”

Free Research Field

文化研究

Academic Significance and Societal Importance of the Research Achievements

本研究のもっとも重要な学術的意義は、学際的な研究であることである。これまで学際的研究の大切さは強調されてきたが、＜身体＞と＜歴史・社会＞そして＜美学＞をむすぶ研究は少なった。本研究は、モダンダンスを軸に近代東アジアの身体的越境／政治的ヒエラルキーとヘゲモニーの関係を具体的な事例研究で明らかにした。また日本、韓国、欧米の学会で研究成果を発表することによって、今後さらに国際的研究の可能性を広げることができた。