Showcasing our cultural diversity
- By Nandini Bhautoo-Dewnarain
- Published 11/27/2009
This is news we have been waiting for, for a long time - that our country will finally have an officially designated public space devoted to the promotion and showcasing of Arts and Culture, in all their manifold forms.
For despite our recriminations on this theme, as notoriously recriminating islanders, all foreign observers are ready to recognise that Mauritius is probably one of the most vibrant cultural spaces in the Indian Ocean.
But of two important issues pertaining to this, the first is that we are collectively haunted by a sense of lack, of the fragment, probably a consequence of our incapacity with dealing with the colliding narratives of past, uneasily shaping the present, and the second is that there has still not emerged an official national policy on Arts and Culture.We need to work towards a definition of the relationship between popular culture, folk culture, traditional culture and commonly understood high culture and their interrelationship within the landscape of our lived existence.
Let us remind ourselves that the queries as to who, which Ministry promotes which art form are but administrative decisions which unfortunately have practical consequences in dichotomising art forms.
We know how much of a trap this can be and it is very unfortunate for the country. It has escaped no one that the unbelievable Rs 10 million earmarked for
promotion of Arts is an economically orientated decision, geared towards creating a destination for cultural tourism. But so what! Let us play with this and hope and dream, that it will bring to us the means and resources for a cultural transformation of the future. We have to showcase our multicultural reality.
But which culture? If we put aside the truism that culture is an everyday lived reality , our focus will be on conscious cultural production, emanating from lived reality. All will agree that ethnic culture is what attracts tourists most, and this sphere has most potential in manifestations pertaining to dance, music, painting, theatre. But we should not fall into a trap of 'recreated authentic' cultures, and run the risk of fetichising cultural forms, and entrapping them in a logic of repetition and lack of creativity. We must not forget that we need to create the energies for creative dynamism for cultural production.
And that is a complex process whereby one becomes a producer of art work if one has been in one way or another a 'consumer' of art works. It is therefore important that whoever directs the forthcoming strategies remembers that they need to work as much for tourists as for Mauritian audiences; that exposure to the Mural art tradition of Senegal and Bihar is as important as learning the nuances of Tap dance and the rhythms of Salsa and Flamenco; that the world has to be brought in first before we can be in a position to give back dynamic cultural production in all spheres.
For despite our recriminations on this theme, as notoriously recriminating islanders, all foreign observers are ready to recognise that Mauritius is probably one of the most vibrant cultural spaces in the Indian Ocean.
But of two important issues pertaining to this, the first is that we are collectively haunted by a sense of lack, of the fragment, probably a consequence of our incapacity with dealing with the colliding narratives of past, uneasily shaping the present, and the second is that there has still not emerged an official national policy on Arts and Culture.We need to work towards a definition of the relationship between popular culture, folk culture, traditional culture and commonly understood high culture and their interrelationship within the landscape of our lived existence.
Let us remind ourselves that the queries as to who, which Ministry promotes which art form are but administrative decisions which unfortunately have practical consequences in dichotomising art forms.
We know how much of a trap this can be and it is very unfortunate for the country. It has escaped no one that the unbelievable Rs 10 million earmarked for
But which culture? If we put aside the truism that culture is an everyday lived reality , our focus will be on conscious cultural production, emanating from lived reality. All will agree that ethnic culture is what attracts tourists most, and this sphere has most potential in manifestations pertaining to dance, music, painting, theatre. But we should not fall into a trap of 'recreated authentic' cultures, and run the risk of fetichising cultural forms, and entrapping them in a logic of repetition and lack of creativity. We must not forget that we need to create the energies for creative dynamism for cultural production.
And that is a complex process whereby one becomes a producer of art work if one has been in one way or another a 'consumer' of art works. It is therefore important that whoever directs the forthcoming strategies remembers that they need to work as much for tourists as for Mauritian audiences; that exposure to the Mural art tradition of Senegal and Bihar is as important as learning the nuances of Tap dance and the rhythms of Salsa and Flamenco; that the world has to be brought in first before we can be in a position to give back dynamic cultural production in all spheres.
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