Nissan Seminar: 'Experiencing the Amami Islands through Music: Performance and Participatory Workshop with Shimauta Artists'

Convener(s): Dr Alice Baldock and Professor Sho Konishi

Speaker(s): Shimauta Artists

Ugaminshoran! We are a collective of performers (utasha) devoted to the Shimauta traditions of the Amami Islands, Japan. Rooted in the rich natural environment of the archipelago, recognized as a UNESCO World Natural Heritage site, Shimauta has been passed down by our ancestors for more than 400 years despite histories of political and cultural oppression.

Through performances of song and dance, we invite audiences into the cultural world of Amami while engaging with themes such as spirituality, history, local industries, the institutionalization of culture, and gender. At its core, the project reflects on what it means to preserve and transmit oral traditions and embodied cultural knowledge across generations.