State effects and festival performances: Indigenous Australian participation in the Festival of Pacific Arts

Henry, Rosita

Abstract

In order to shed light on the creative ways that the concept of cultural heritage is being employed in response to global processes in the Pacific, this chapter focuses on the Festival of Pacific Arts, initially called the South Pacific Festival of Arts. I specifically focus on the festival as a site of political engagement between local communities and the state. Participants at the Festival of Pacific Arts are supported to attend the event as delegates and representatives of their nation-states. Yet, my research reveals that for at least some delegates, performing at the festival appears to be as much about discounting the state as representing it. Although the festival is clearly a state affair, it also provides fertile ground for grassroots action and a performative engagement with political alternatives. As David Guss (2000:172) concludes in his book The Festive State, in which he explores the power of the state to harness festive forms in its own interests: 'To those involved the stakes are high. For, as participants well know, festivals, for all their joy and color, are also battlegrounds where identities are fought over and communities made'.

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Pacific Alternatives: cultural politics in contemporary Oceania

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978-1-907774-38-6

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Sean Kingston Publishing

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Canon Pyon, UK

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