{"id":8401,"date":"2025-04-09T13:51:02","date_gmt":"2025-04-09T11:51:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.uni.lu\/c2dh-en\/?post_type=articles&p=8401"},"modified":"2025-05-06T12:52:11","modified_gmt":"2025-05-06T10:52:11","slug":"dancing-as-historical-method","status":"publish","type":"articles","link":"https:\/\/www.uni.lu\/c2dh-en\/articles\/dancing-as-historical-method\/","title":{"rendered":"What nightlife can tell us. Dancing as historical method"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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A three-year study at the C\u00b2DH explored how realities as evanescent and unserious as dance parties have been documented in archives and can be reclaimed through an experimental methodology.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nAn \u201ceventful\u201d methodology<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

The Popkult60 research project (FNR-DFG)<\/a>, focusing on European transnational popular culture in the long Sixties, gave C\u00b2DH researcher Laura Steil the opportunity to deploy an experimental methodology, in the form of creative reenactments, to uncover the history of balls in Esch-sur-Alzette, centering on the working-class Grenz<\/em> neighborhood. For her Dancing Esch<\/em> project, she collaborated with local cultural players such as Kufa, Ferroforum, BiBSS and Escher Theater, with Luxembourgish swing dancers and an orchestra led by Luciano Pagliarini, to conceive the Swigning Esch<\/em> and Feier\u00f4wend <\/em>events.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They were inspired from data collected in national, municipal, and private archives, oral history interviews, and ethnographic observations. Importantly, they relied on crafting meaningful relationships with people over time<\/a>, and inviting them to participate in the research process. These events not only produced or helped uncover historical sources\u2014new research participants, additional narratives, first-hand sensorial experiences, etc.\u2014 but also elicited different research questions and refreshed Laura Steil\u2019s interpretation of more traditional datasets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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