Performance in the round: Embedded audiency at music-dance events in Mali

In many West African dance-drumming genres, the emphasis is on involving the gathered community in the performance, inviting them to take turns dancing. In such performance contexts, there is no audience in the strict sense: no group of participants who are not themselves directly involved as performers. Based on ethnographic case studies of music-dance events in rural southern Mali, this article argues for the concept of embedded audiency, showing how musicians provide dancers with the crucial contributions of audiency to performance: focused attention, social recognition, and meaning.