The Street Dance Club of Yilan County’s Nanao High School swept to sudden fame this month following a performance at a competition where it mixed urban and traditional Aboriginal dance moves.
It was the first time the club — whose members are mostly of junior-high school age — had competed in such an event, club president Lu Mai-ko (呂麥克) said.
It was an emotional experience for the troupe to use traditional Aboriginal dance elements, with which they have been familiar since childhood, Lu said, adding that members hope to define themselves as students of Atayal origin at their school, which comprises both a junior-high school and senior-high school.
Photo: Chien Hui-ju, Taipei Times
The club was founded over the winter vacation after its instructor — Chang Chen-feng — a Nanao resident studying in Taipei — returned to their hometown to give a dance performance.
“It provided us a chance to learn from a real instructor, whereas we learned street dance styles and moves primarily from watching videos online,” Lu said.
The Aboriginal elements in the dance, such as traditional movements mimicking the sifting of rice and interweaving of red and white cloths, are important cultural aspects of the Atayal people, Chang said.
The soundtrack to the dance includes gunshots, which represents the community losing its ancestral land and being conquered, Chang said.
Learning street dance was hard, and often the troupe were bruised after practicing moves, especially downrock moves — movement on the floor supported by either hands or feet, Lu said.
“We kept practicing because we wanted to be able to participate in more competitions and have more opportunities to perform,” Lu said.
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