Negotiating contemporary issues through cultural creative dance expressions

Abstract

This study sought to negotiate contemporary issues through cultural creative dance expressions. The study delves into the techniques of dramatisation in the dances, contextualised in their cultural and creative contexts. The synthesis of these concepts was propped on aesthetic theory, semiotics and discourses on African performance for the description of style, themes and messaging. The study was framed on qualitative design to analyse purposively sampled cultural creative dances on various chosen themes and cultures. Primary data included data observed in the sampled dances as well as unstructured interviews. Secondary data was gathered from books, journals, articles and online publications. The data was analysed using content analysis. The study finds that, indeed, a cultural creative dance performed in the Kenya Schools and Colleges Drama Festival tackle various themes that are derived from various issues the Kenyan society is grappling with. The study findings also note that the artist has a central role in bringing issues to the fore and affirms the cultural creative dance as a powerful and enduring platform for ruminating on societal concerns. In conclusion, the cultural creative dance, as the foregoing discourse elucidates, is a potent, lively and well-grounded mode of communicating and discussing the issues in the hearts of individual citizens and the nation at large.