Eiko & Koma; Asian American Dance

Abstract

Asian-American dance study is an integration of dance studies and Asian-American studies. The existence of social and political stereotypes on Asian-American dancers often categorizes them into an oriental labeling. The labeling of Asian-American dancers based on their ethnicity and their culture’s history in the United States and not considering the artists’ intent and the nature of their works cause this orientalism bias. Due to lack of researches in the past, older generations of Asian-American dancers in the United States fell victim to this oriental labeling. Anything that the public did not seem to understand often led them to believe what they were seeing was foreign. It is not about the issue of racism that this study intends to bring, but rather this study will focus on the Asian-American dancers’ place of belonging in the American society. Eiko & Koma, two renown Asian-American dancers, have an extensive performance career throughout their lives traveling from Japan to Europe in the early 1970s and eventually settling down in the United States in 1976. Eiko & Koma witnessed through the social, economic, and political changes in the United States from the mid-1970s to present. This research will focus on the perceptions on Asian-American dancers by the American society both in the past and the present and address the issues that revolve around them primarily through the works of Eiko & Koma and their career history.