Basque ethnography at a glance
Antzasti, the Basque traditional house. Esteban Ramos.
The house has been for centuries a fundamental pillar of society and the very foundation of our way of life. Family and home have been essentially synonymous concepts in our culture: in fact, instead of the term familia ‘family’ we use the expression etxekoak, from etxe ‘house, home’, to signify ‘them who belong to the house, household’, a clear exponent of the circumstance we try to illustrate. Traditionally, the members of a household make up the house, and conversely, they owe their name and identity to their birthplace, as Xalbador’s beautiful verses remind us. A close, solid and indivisible bond, if ever there was one. (more…)
Stick dance. Villabuena-Eskuernaga (Álava). Kaxkabar Dantza Taldea. Emilio Xabier Dueñas.
Dance and creative movement are universal forms of communication and self-expression (language through motion), generally associated with music or rhythm, their creation, preservation and execution having fallen on different social layers throughout history.
Basque ‘traditional’ dance, as we know it, is the result of a process of survival over time, with its ups and downs, and more interruptions, in its performance, than we might think of. Its contours should therefore not fool us into defending a supposed past longevity and authenticity which would force us to travel back to the ‘night of time’. (more…)
Hermitage of St Salvador in Ardanaz (Izagaondoa, Navarre), whose roof was restored a few decades ago using tiles manufactured in Aizpe. Fernando Hualde.
Certain trades from the past are disappearing; modern times sweep them away without mercy. And with them go the works, yards or factories where those activities used to be carried out. Whole villages might in fact be lost, and also the people who worked and lived there or knew about them.
This is exactly what happened with the roof tile factory of Aizpe, in Lower Urraúl (Navarre). The tile makers departed this life, the factory vanished in thin air, the village is nowhere to be seen, and him who as a child and teenager stored memories of that place passed away a few months ago… Gone is the last witness of it all. (more…)
Popular dance. José Arrue.
By accepting that tradition is a constantly evolving concept, we accept that it will not always move in the right direction. Nevertheless, those of us who are part of that tradition and promote it must be aware of the responsibility such a task entails. What we do will have an effect, in one way or another, on the evolution and future of the said tradition.
Slowly but surely, traditional dance tends towards normalization, and thus away from diversity. It might be on the right path, it might be on the wrong path: for better or for worse, it depends on the eye of the beholder. (more…)
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