[Tango-L] Multiple personalities

Sat Jun 3 04:10:41 EDT 2006

Look, man,

I'm not trying to hurt your feelings. I'm just trying to move this 
discussion into the 21st century, which began a number of years ago. 
(Whichever year you pin it on, 00 or 01.)

So, thank you (sincerely: I'll be momentarily stupid, and brave the 
dangers) for welcoming me to the forum. No hard feelings here either.

Let me proceed by clarifying two matters, and asking questions about a 
third one. Much of the rest is immaterial at this point.

First, I didn't mean to imply that you're a moderator on this list. 
Someone else expressed confusion about that too. Rather, I meant to 
indicate my impatience with the way you assumed that role with regard to 
this specific topic, summarizing things, and telling everyone what 
counts as authentic and what doesn't, despite disagreement from people 
posting in BA (or about repeated experiences in BA). Also, one can (in 
English) preside over something, or try to, without any need of the 
title "president." Enough about that.

Secondly, I told Lucia to kiss my ass, and in so-called "Jew-code" 
(hardly), because she baited a hook for me, I read the signal, and I 
willingly bit, to see where it would go. She then returned the shot, and 
can take it up with me further if she so desires. Not very complicated. 
(As for the Yiddish-- she referred to New Yorkers in a way that implied 
she'd lived there.)

So, on to the question....

What ARE these mysterious male and female roles? You seem to imply that 
only with them is the tango "authentic" (or "Argentine": same difference 
in this forum, it seems). But you, and everyone else here, refuses to 
say what they are. We're beginning to explore things in the spinoff 
discussion about how men can follow in a masculine way, but that's only 
part of it. And it seems that you and some others here aren't willing to 
grant that a pedigree anyway. Well then, fine. YOU tell me what a male 
role is, and what a female role is.

This is where I see a hole in this argument big enough to heap a 
mountain in, with a train running through it.

Example: A stereotypical male role could be either
(a) bull
(b) matador

These are perfectly opposed. I can imagine them together, with two men 
dancing, the Tango. I can also imagine either one with a woman, as I'm 
sure many a woman here most happily has herself.

Stereotypical female roles:
(a) femme fatale
(b) Cinderella

Same situation.

You can match up any of these roles two-by-two, and you'd get something 
dramatic. Something _alive_.

Now, if you're going to tell me that the Official, Government-approved 
tango can't abide the same-sex pairings here, I'm going to tell you 
you're flat-out wrong, because I and other dancers have enough 
imagination and skill to make it happen, just as others have already 
done it. I might not have the skill tomorrow, but give me another year 
and I'll give you a run for your money, whether it's in Pesos or Dollars 
or Euros or Yen.

And if you're going to insist that the tango Must Have a male and a 
female role, I'm going to ask you what the hell those really are, 
because those words mean nothing without specifics. Moreover, what 
gender hath a leprechaun? a pixie? even a "ciruja" without the La or the 
El? When you start thinking like a poet, and imagining not what has 
been, but what could be created with a little effort, gender roles in 
the dance really do begin to dematerialize. These things are more 
slippery in reality-- not to mention in art-- than you imply. And if you 
try to think me into a box, I'll end up thinking myself out the other 
side. Just because our brains have two halves doesn't mean they have to 
take turns, you see.

I will concede you one point I disputed before: I do have multiple 
personalities. All of us do. It's the glory of humanity, and it's why we 
all have more than one facial expression, except for Clint Eastwood.

In closing, I still don't see the sense in thinking the tango the sole 
possession of Argentina anymore. You're the biggest shareholder in the 
firm, and it's got your logo on it, but that's about it. And for that 
matter, there IS variety in Argentina-- you keep saying so yourself, and 
we've had a variety of posts here as evidence-- so I don't see how 
invoking the nation, in support of one way of dancing over any other, 
can possibly carry any weight. I doubt that ten people could speak in 
its name, let alone one.

Plus, we're seeing that there's (friendly, and very fruitful) 
disagreement about the meaning of a single word-- again, the sly 
"ciruja"-- so let's not imagine for a second that anything Argentine can 
be reduced to a single definition, whether it be "vagrant" or "one man 
and one woman." For crying out loud, the country's flag, depending on 
how you look at it, has either one white stripe, two blue ones, or three 
altogether-- plus what appears to be either the sun with a hangover, a 
gold medal for soccer, or Francisco Canaro getting a very bad haircut.
http://www.converge.org.nz/lac/country/argentina.htm

As for my "tango moments" post-- thanks for getting something out of it. 
It was only towards the end of it that I realized I was muddling two 
distinct things together (the "moment" and the "trance"), and for the 
sake of further discussion, I started clarifying them. Specifics: as 
always. Their absence lies at the root of most disagreements here. I 
hope we can make their inclusion a habit.

En pantoufles,

Jake Spatz
Washington, DC

Sergio Vandekier wrote:
> I did not intend to answer your gratuitous attacks but you repitedly asked 
> for a reply, here it is:
>
> 1 - "First off, you're issuing forth an idealized, Star Trek version of
> gender roles (minus Captain Kirk, I might add), and asking us to believe
> that this pipe-dream of equality is not only behind the brothel-born
> tango, but a uniquely Argentine phenomenon, which the rest of the
> cement-headed world has never even heard of."
>
> Not true, I merely described the culture where tango roles came from.
>
> 2 -"Secondly, you haven't done Squat to describe what those roles actually
> are, besides assigning (tautologically) the man's role to the man, and
> the woman's role to the woman."
>
>   I was going to describe exactly in detail how those roles are played in 
> tango but you suddenly appeared from nowhere and decided that my 
> participation on this subject had finished.
>
> 3 - "Thirdly, you seem to have reached your conclusion about the place a
> leading woman has in the tango world Well Before posing the question to
> anyone here, so I don't understand how you can even maintain the
> pretense of presiding over an open discussion."
>
> I would like to know what conclusion I had reached.
>
> You gave me the titles of president and moderator of the list. I was neither 
> of them. I spend about 5 months a year in Argentina , period during which I 
> do not even read the list. The discussion had started because somebody asked 
> about "Women leading".  I was moderating nothing. I was not presiding over 
> anything.
>
> 4 - " Like many a pedant before
> you, you arrange the available evidence (or the portion of it you find
> attractive) so that it seems to support your prefabricated conclusion,
> sweep the rest under the carpet, and voila-- Thou Art the Very
> Mouthpiece of The Trumpet of the Tango."
>
> Another gratuitous accusation but I concede defit on this point. You win: 
> nobody will ever be more pedantic than you.
>
> 5 - "Meanwhile, voices dissenting
> from yours get the spit-valve concession of being perfectly acceptable
> if they squeak, but no longer "Argentine," because they depart from this
> walking caricature you insist on equating with real life."
>
> Again all your own fabrication.  We were having one of the best discussions 
> the list had ever had.
>
> It may come as a surprise to you but there are places where men and women 
> are happy, enjoy being what they are and they respect each other.  What  I 
> described is the truth. It was also described by Nicole Nau in detail in her 
> book "El Tango un Baiole bien portenio" .
>
> 7 - "To your credit, you reverse your statements in light of contrary
> evidence, as you did when reminded of the charming story, "Rudolpho Goes
> to the Wrong Neighborhood," which paints Buenos Aires in a
> less-than-heavenly light."
>
> You painted a picture of a city bitterly divided  due to tango styles.  
> Something like what happens in New York or L.A. with gang members killing 
> each other  over insignificant disagreements.
>
> I explained to you that that was not so.  All that you had to do to go to 
> another neigborhood milonga was to dance the style most people danced there 
> and behave properly till they got to know you. If you went there as a 
> "Compadrito" dancing in a way that was disturbing to the members of the club 
> (this happens today in many places in the USA) the organizers of the milonga 
> would ask you politely to stop doing that or to leave the dance floor.  The 
> city was not "bitterly divided over tango styles".
>
> 8 - "The simple fact is that there is a wide variety of opinion as to the
> woman's role in tango, and that a lot of this variety has come from
> people posting IN Buenos Aires. They've spoken for themselves, and your
> simplistic summaries will not smother them out."
>
> I wonder what is that you are talking about.  Again it may come as a shock 
> to you but the human race is divided in males and females.  Members of those 
> genders in Argentina ( I mention In Argentina because this  is relevant as I 
> am talking about tango roles as a reflection of society as a whole) are 
> equal but different and this is described by Nicole in her book and by many 
> others.
> Tango has two distinct roles : feminine one and masculine the other. There 
> is plenty of literature about this including the book I have mentioned . 
> Those roles are played in the dance. I was going to describe them in detail 
> but you came in, barking and spitting poison.
>
> 9 - "Neither, for that
> matter, will appeals to Buenos Aires as the tabernacle of authenticity.
> By the time we're done sorting out tango propaganda from tango history,
> we've still got the great variety of how people actually dance, and the
> everlasting plurality of styles-- plus the innovative dancers known as
> artists, who set fire to all these useless blanket statements and modify
> tradition by the presence of their own blazing originality."
>
> Buenos Aires continues to be the tabernacle of authenticity.  I wonder if 
> you or anyone could mention only one variation in tango dancing that was not 
> created in Buenos Aires. Only one.
>
> The truth is that tango all over the world looks at Buenos Aires for 
> inspiration and try to duplicate all the styles that are in experimentation 
> there.  The only real innovators that were not Argentines were the creators 
> of the ' International Tango style", the variation of the same known as
> ''American Ballrom tango" and the " Finnish Tango that created an 
> amalgamation or fusion.
>
> Finnish tango can be seen as reflecting Finnishness at a meeting place 
> between cultures. Pirjo Kukkonen, an academic who has studied the matter, 
> identifies numerous borrowed elements in the Finnish tango, the sounds of 
> faraway Argentina, a German march style and the romantic longing of Russia. 
> "It is a product of cultural fusion," she says, "but it contains a Finnish 
> dynamic and identity.
>
> So anything else was born in Argentina.
>
> Summary:  You came from nowhere spitting venom like a cobra. Accused me of 
> all sort of things, gave me titles that I did not have (president and 
> mooderator) then proceeded to show another one of your personalities: the 
> easy going, flrolicky fox that was KIDDING, made references to me as " our 
> dear Sergio" promised to behave well and to make this forum very 
> interesting.
>
> Despite of your promises you insulted Lucia yesterday telling her in a 
> dialect used by jews Kiss my ass.
>
> This list has no president and no modertors we are all equal contributors.
>
> So you were misguided when took "the Kingdom" off my hands,  unfortunately, 
> there was no king, there is no throne or palace.  I welcome you to the list, 
> I like your notes, mostly the 'One liners' about tango moments. By the way I 
> would like to ask you how is that you have several hours of Tango moments 
> while most milongueros in Buenos Aires only get some transient episodes and 
> very far in between. I am very anxious to learn from you in this respect and 
> many other subjects related to tango.
>
> Welcome to the list, no hard feelings on my part.  The stage is all yours.
>
> Sergio
>
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