Dancing Indigenous Worlds: Choreographies of Relation by Jacqueline Shea Murphy (review)

Reviewed by: Dancing Indigenous Worlds: Choreographies of Relation by Jacqueline Shea Murphy David Delgado Shorter (bio) Dancing Indigenous Worlds: Choreographies of Relation by Jacqueline Shea Murphy University of Minnesota Press, 2022 IN HER LATEST BOOK, Jacqueline Shea Murphy continues the enriching scholarship that she so beautifully embodied in her previous work, The People Never Stopped Dancing (2007). Murphy devotes her attention here to how Indigenous choreographers are laboring toward a decolonized future. To explicate the methods and effects of these choreographic "resurge-instances," as she terms them, Murphy accentuates relationality in her research methods, her book structure, and her theoretical formulation (20). The book contains a lengthy introduction that delineates how Murphy understands the current project as building substantially upon her previous research and other works in Indigenous dance studies. She offers two chapters on relational reciprocity and perspectival relationality, respectively. While the first chapter brings us to Aotearoa, the second focuses on movement workshops led by Rulan Tangen. Both chapters embody the relationality in the author's methods. Murphy resists taking sole authority for her representations by including the voices of Jack Gray, Rulan Tangen, and others. The text engenders a polyvocality and centering of Indigenous intelligence that further illustrates a way of producing scholarship with rather than about. Next, Murphy offers an interlude, an ethnographic play-by-play of a 2010 work by Tanya Lakin Linklater at the annual Ode'min Giizis Festival. The images included here are particularly useful and poignant. Readers are shown how dance can bring history into the sensorial realm. Continuing her speaking with approach, Murphy makes the effective decision to include Tanya Lukin Linklater's written response to Murphy's written representation of her and her work. This section engenders a form of grace that scholars could model as they think, write, and represent with others. Murphy's own characterizations are held accountable by the artists in the focus of her analysis. I imagine this "interlude/pause/provocation" section to be one of the most useful as a stand-alone assigned reading in a course. Murphy demonstrates how scholarly interpretation can richly include our collaborators in the research rather than simply objectifying them in the scholarly gaze (266). End Page 153 In the last two chapters, Murphy proposes the lenses of abun-dance and refusings. Murphy maintains a commitment to relational research and writing, as the chapters feature a study of the work of Emily Johnson and Australian choreographic works of refusal; we gain Indigenous perspectives on the research through Murphy's inclusion of others' voices (Mishuana Goeman, Rosy Simas, Tonya Lakin Linklater, and Daystar/Rosalia Jones). Not satisfied with quotes or short phrases from these peers, Murphy clearly knows that we gain more value in reading first-person insights. Murphy's text puts her theory into practice: she makes good kin in an academic mode ofknowledge-making. Murphy conveys an extraordinary amount of insight through her writing, gems not quite showcased in the table of contents or the unfortunately sparse index. With over two hundred pages of complex and highly associated thinking, I initially found myself looking for a subject in the index that did not appear to be listed. Then in the reading, I was elated to see the subject was in the body of the text. And while Murphy does give an (oddly framed) discussion of what "Indigenous" might mean (32–38), she avoids the contentious issue of who is Indigenous, a prominent line of inquiry in contemporary discussions of erasure. To be clear, Murphy's text cannot be faulted for not doing enough. This book seems to burst at the seams (or "binding" as the case may be). I was particularly impressed by her ability to cover such a wide range of issues in Native studies, such as epistemology, memory, temporality, queerness, narration, and dramaturgy. While some of her scholarly touchstones might not be obvious choices, she clearly knows the field well. Jaqueline Shea Murphy demonstrates with agility her range of influences, from dance studies, performance studies, and Indigenous studies simultaneously if not equally. The writing magnetically keeps the reader not only engaged but constantly aware of the stakes. How important is dance to decolonization? Murphy quotes one of...