BEAUTY AND THE BEAST: THE SAN FRANCISCO ETHNIC DANCE FESTIVAL'S GLOBAL STAGE

Founded in 1978, prior to America's multicultural boom, the San Francisco Ethnic Dance Festival provided a much-needed opportunity to minority dancers for greater visibility and a level of status that was previously unattainable. Looked at 35 years past its inception, several distortions become apparent that need interrogation in order to disentangle some socio-cultural predicaments that impede SFEDF's growth. In its mission "to celebrate culturally diverse dance forms," is cultural understanding truly being advanced, or are Western aesthetics simply repositioned to create homogenized ethnic dances? Have representatives of minority dances succumbed to another form of ill-disguised elitism? Do audiences simply wish to be given a kind of Disneyland ride in the name of cultural diversity? This paper offers a critical look at selected issues inherent in what seems to be a hotbed of world dance representation and considers some more culturally viable solutions for the 21st century.