Professor Anna B. Scott
CHASS F1RST Fine Arts Course
The swine flu, waste of water, water pollution, budget cuts and lack of school spirit are issues that are often discussed at the University of California Riverside (UCR) however on Thursday June 4th our CHASS F1RST Fine Arts Course gave life to those issues in an unorthodox form. Each group from the class created a performance that with its symbolism addressed one of the issues surrounding us today through movements instead of words.
UCR prides itself on being the most diverse university in the UC system and this is the reason some students chose to attend this university however students soon realize that even though there is diversity there is no unity. This is why JuicyR chose to address the issue of lack of school spirit and unity. We all soon realized that one of the reasons that school unity is not present at UCR is because each diverse group tends to just remain with people of their same ethnicity or diversity. Our group chose to address the issue of both diversity and school spirit because we deduced that a way to fix the lack of school spirit is to unite the different diversity through a common element, UCR.
In class we learned that Candomblé was a result of the syncretism between the Africans slaves' old religion and Catholicism. It was difficult for me to understand the concept of two distinct religions uniting to create a unique new religion in Brazil. When we began to discuss ways of addressing the issue of lack of school spirit we figured that a nice way to unite the different ethnic groups would be to find similarities between them like Candomblé does with both the African religion and Catholicism. Being part of the UCR student body was the common element that all of the different ethnic groups. Using syncretism to unite the different ethnic groups at school allowed me to better understand how Brazil was able to unite to seemingly different religions to form a new one that held qualities that both of them shared.
We all figured that it would be nice if we could come up with a dance that demonstrated that having school spirit could unite all the ethnic groups present at UCR. We had three choreographers in our group who decided that it would be easier if we came up with three different dances in order to distinguish what part each choreographer came up with. Since there were fourteen members in the group we chose to split the group into three different groups that could symbolize the diverse groups that are present at UCR. After splitting up into the three different groups the choreographers decided to come up with different dances that would show the separate ethnic groups at the school. The choreographers chose to create an individual dance for each group that would reflect diversity.
At the beginning of the parade our group is split into three distinct groups the "U," the "C," and the "R." Each group had its own dance walk in order to keep with the theme of diversity. Even though each had its own walk all walks had to include some sort of gesture that coincided with the letter they are associated with in order for the dances to have a common thread that kept them together just like UCR is the common thread that unites all the different ethnic groups on campus. The "U" crew's, this is the group I belonged to, dance walk consisted of raising both our arms in order to form the "U" as we walked. It was our intention to keep the "U" that our arms form up the entire parade route however after the first run threw of the parade route we realized that our arms would be exhausted and therefore we made the necessary adjustment of raising and lowering our arms as we walked along the route.
UCR prides itself on being the most diverse university in the UC system and this is the reason some students chose to attend this university however students soon realize that even though there is diversity there is no unity. This is why JuicyR chose to address the issue of lack of school spirit and unity. We all soon realized that one of the reasons that school unity is not present at UCR is because each diverse group tends to just remain with people of their same ethnicity or diversity. Our group chose to address the issue of both diversity and school spirit because we deduced that a way to fix the lack of school spirit is to unite the different diversity through a common element, UCR.
In class we learned that Candomblé was a result of the syncretism between the Africans slaves' old religion and Catholicism. It was difficult for me to understand the concept of two distinct religions uniting to create a unique new religion in Brazil. When we began to discuss ways of addressing the issue of lack of school spirit we figured that a nice way to unite the different ethnic groups would be to find similarities between them like Candomblé does with both the African religion and Catholicism. Being part of the UCR student body was the common element that all of the different ethnic groups. Using syncretism to unite the different ethnic groups at school allowed me to better understand how Brazil was able to unite to seemingly different religions to form a new one that held qualities that both of them shared.
We all figured that it would be nice if we could come up with a dance that demonstrated that having school spirit could unite all the ethnic groups present at UCR. We had three choreographers in our group who decided that it would be easier if we came up with three different dances in order to distinguish what part each choreographer came up with. Since there were fourteen members in the group we chose to split the group into three different groups that could symbolize the diverse groups that are present at UCR. After splitting up into the three different groups the choreographers decided to come up with different dances that would show the separate ethnic groups at the school. The choreographers chose to create an individual dance for each group that would reflect diversity.
At the beginning of the parade our group is split into three distinct groups the "U," the "C," and the "R." Each group had its own dance walk in order to keep with the theme of diversity. Even though each had its own walk all walks had to include some sort of gesture that coincided with the letter they are associated with in order for the dances to have a common thread that kept them together just like UCR is the common thread that unites all the different ethnic groups on campus. The "U" crew's, this is the group I belonged to, dance walk consisted of raising both our arms in order to form the "U" as we walked. It was our intention to keep the "U" that our arms form up the entire parade route however after the first run threw of the parade route we realized that our arms would be exhausted and therefore we made the necessary adjustment of raising and lowering our arms as we walked along the route.
When we all reached the performance stop the "U" crew was the first to perform to Bonde Do Role's "Solta o Frango." "C" crew followed with a performance to Quincy Jones "Soul Bossa Nova." "R" crew ends the individual groups' performance with Tchiko Tchikaya's "Nostalgie Africa Dance Machine." Finally we all end the performance with a mix of all three songs that allows every group to unite and perform around 10 seconds of the other groups dance in order to highlight the acceptance of the differences that exist among each group. We chose different songs in order to demonstrate the variety that exists between ethnic groups. After the mix we all take out our streamers and perform to the Kool & the Gang's "Celebration" in order to show the happiness that we all feel to be part of UCR. When we perform "Celebration" we chant "U-C-River-side come on!" in order to exhibit that UCR united the different ethnic groups through school spirit. After we join and "celebrate" that we are part of UCR we walk out with our streamers raised high and flowing. We do not return to the individual "U" "C" "R" groups in order to show that once we are connected we cannot be separated.
Our costumes consisted of us wearing blue t-shirts with our individual letters in gold. We chose those colors because they are the schools colors. We did not change colors based on group affiliation in order to highlight, yet again, that there are threads that unite the ethnic groups. Allowing everyone to wear a t-shirt with the individual letter of their group allowed us to better demonstrate the unity of the group and show that without the different ethnic groups we could not have "U.C.R." during our performance of the mix of all the songs and "Celebration." The t-shirts allowed us to line up next to each other and spell out "U.C.R." at the end of the performance in order.
I would not change anything from our performance because I believe that we accurately presented our theme through our movements and songs. However I would try and get our group to work on the synchronisation of the dances that ended our performance in order for it to look more coordinated.
The performance allowed me to realize that I am really good at scheduling and getting information out to the people from the group. Most importantly though I realized that I can actually get over my shyness and perform when I am having fun and I feel comfortable with the people around me. I loved this assignment because it allowed me to get over my fears of performing and meeting new people.
PARABENS! What a superb essay! I really enjoyed your opening paragraph. I hope you'll think about writing for the school newspaper! One issue: commas. You actually seem to avoid them. Maybe it was a formatting issue? Commas go typically where you would pause to catch your breath, grammatically that location is after a prepositional phrase or to set apart an antecedent. Go back check that out. You guys did a great job with a very touchy subject. Congrats on putting thought into motion and turning planning into action!
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