Jews, Blood & Ethiopian Dance in Israel

Summary

The first scholarly article on the Ethiopian dance theatre group Eskesta (Baum 2001) appeared in a volume dedicated to community theatre and socio-political inclusion, Performing Democracy. I sought to share my experiences of diasporic Africa in the Middle East, the virtuosity of young Ethiopian dancers in Haifa, and the stories they produced through the media of music, traditional movement and modern dance. I had watched Eskesta since 1996, a formative year, when I was asked to advise the University of Haifa whether to endorse the group. I gave my unqualified approval, but doubted the group's ability to maintain its particular, ethnic contribution while integrating aesthetic ‘rules’ of contemporary modern dance. Having practised West African dance as well as other forms, I secretly hoped the dancers would abandon ‘new’ dance forms and exclusively embrace their own cultural movement – not because it was more ‘authentic’ but because the aesthetic moved me. I worried that Euro-American dance would shift the centrality of embodied narratives, diminishing the power of telling and hearing Ethiopian stories in the Israeli vortex. I also feared that by appropriating contemporary dance the group would be forced into comparison with other ‘black’ (actually African-American) dance companies, such as Alvin Ailey or Bill T. Jones. Would this group lose its special identity within the Beta Israel community, Israel and world Jewry, as the solitary group of Jewish Ethiopian performers to emerge?