Patria Roman-Velazquez

The embodiment of salsa: musicians, instruments and the performance of a Latin style and identity

I have attempted to contribute to debates about the body and music through a discussion of how the performance of salsa constructs a particular sense of Latin identity through the bodies of musicians. The embodiment of salsa is proposed as a way of theorising about how body and music are articulated to communicate a particular Latin cultural identity. In considering the relationship between body and music, I have stressed the cultural construction of bodies in the sense in which bodies are not neutral biological essences. Salsa clubs in London have provided a focus for studying the construction of Latin identities as embodied and communicated by performing salsa musicians and how this is informed by specific codes of gender, sexuality and ethnicity. Throughout this essay I have argued that the embodiment of salsa develops through specific practices whereby instruments, performance techniques, vocal sounds, bodily movements and ways of dressing are encoded and experienced as part of a particular Latin identity. I also explained how the existence of essentialist beliefs about a natural Latin body and musical abilities, although a constraint, were challenged by musicians who are making ‘Latin’ music. First, by the involvement of non-Latin musicians in playing salsa, whose practices challenged assumptions about a ‘natural’ relationship between bodies, places and music. Second, through the participation of Latin American musicians and the new styles developing from the interaction between musicians and from having to adapt to different local circumstances. Finally, I mentioned how technological devices, sometimes used to solve practical economic problems, were contributing to the re-making of a Latin music performance and identity in London. I also indicated how the use of both Spanish and English language and the involvement of women in salsa music making were also contributing to a type of salsa and Latin performance. However, whilst musicians have been challenging the idea of essential links between ethnicity, bodies and instruments, the practices through which salsa is embodied have continued to present limitations and expectations for women according to their sexed bodies. Particular expectations about the practices of gender and sexuality became an issue for women in relation to body movements, the use of the voice and instrumental performance. In this paper, focusing on the performance and participation of musicians in the micro setting of a club, I have suggested that womens place in salsa clubs has to be negotiated in relation to what is expected from sexed bodies. This leads me to conclude that unequal relations of power are directly experienced and embodied through gender relations and practices of sexuality and in turn operate as a micro politics of the body.

Latin Americans in London and the Dynamics of Diasporic Identities

The migration of Latin Americans to Britain and the contribution of Latin Americans to London’s distinct and varied cultural ‘ethnoscape’ have been conspicuously neglected in the literature on diasporas.1 The aim of this essay is to make this presence more visible and in doing so I wish to contribute more broadly to debates about the movement and articulation of cultural identities across different geographical locations. This will be done firstly by exploring the ways in which Latin Americans develop routes through the city and establish connections to specific sites; and, secondly, the essay will focus on the ways in which Latin Americans contribute to the changing character of London by transforming these sites, thereby attributing specific Latin identities to them. Studies of diaspora have provided us with ways of understanding the types of connection that people establish with certain locations, as well as the ways in which identities are transformed in the process of relocation. These issues are often explored in relation to the nation-state (through ideas of national and cultural identity) and not in relation to specific sites within the territories in which these groups have relocated.2 However, in approaching the issue of Latin identities in London I draw on the concept of diaspora as a way of understanding the relationship between place and identity.