Contemporary Dance on Native Land: Indigenous Solidarity in the Choreography of Ananya Dance Theatre

Abstract

Ananya Dance Theatre generates a framework for “contemporary dance” as choreography which enacts its solidarity with the land of Native peoples. Artistic director Ananya Chatterjea mobilizes her contemporary aesthetic, “Yorchhā,” through the company's alliance with Indigenous peoples’ worldviews on land and water protection, especially through their relations with Dakota and Anishinaabe persons. Dance analysis of the pieces “Moreechika: Season of Mirage” (2012), “Shaatranga: Women Weaving Worlds” (2018), and “Shyamali: Sprouting Words” (2017) shapes contemporary dance through its engagement with Native persons’ caretaking labor for the environment and the position of these relations in the choreography. A practice of humility emerges as the cornerstone of solidarity in contemporary dance due to the necessity for longstanding Native invitation and engagement, Indigenous narratives and embodiment in the dance pieces, and lessons learned from the pitfalls in intersecting techniques such as Ananya Dance Theatre's with Native people's lifeways and knowledges.