Contemporary PerforMemory

Contemporary PerforMemory looks at dance works created in the 21st century by choreographers identifying as Afro-European, Jewish, Black, Palestinian, and Taiwanese-Chinese-American. It explores how contemporary dance-makers engage with historical traumas such as the Shoah and the Maafa to reimagine how the past is remembered and how the future is anticipated. The new idea of perforMemory arises within a lively blend of interdisciplinary theory, interviews, performance analysis, and personal storytelling. Scholar and artist Layla Zami traces unexpected pathways, inviting the reader to move gracefully across disciplines, geographies, and histories.

Featuring insightful interviews with seven international artists: Oxana Chi, Zufit Simon, André M. Zachery, Chantal Loïal, Wan-Chao Chang, Farah Saleh, and Christiane Emmanuel.

»Zami is committed to a rigorous methodology in order to think through and theorize contemporary dance in diaspora. Her book is intercultural and cross-cultural and demonstrates an understanding of race and gender from the perspective of someone who can think globally. This, combined with a discerning critical eye for reading unique contemporary performance, has yielded a remarkable body of research.«

»Carefully thought out and clearly written and presented, ›Contemporary PerforMemory‹ makes a significant contribution to several fields: memory studies, dance studies, postcolonial studies, diaspora studies, affect studies, as well as scholarly reflections on the archive, on embodiment, the emotions and movement, all from an informed, critical feminist perspective. Zami makes surprising connections that reveal important resonances between shared histories of remembrance.«