Dances 5

DANCE OF THE TEJONEROS

The badgers, Señorcitos de la tierra (“The earth’s little lords”), symbolize the elements that damage the agricultural cycle and represent a threat to the harvest. The dance of the tejoneros (people who fight against the badgers) is a ritual where the gods are asked to stop the badgers and avoid the destruction of the roots and plants.

In order to ask Mother Earth not to leave its sons hungry, the dancers perform around the palo de la danza (pole of the dance), which represents the axis of the world; the woodpecker is incorporated as a solar deity. During the dance, the badger is chased and captured, to guarantee a good harvest.


DANCE OF THE OLD TEJORONES

This dance is a representation of the Passion of Christ. Several biblical characters, such as Pontius Pilate, Herod, Caifas, the Pharisees, the Jews, Christ and the Virgin Mary appear. A violin, a guitar and two drums are used to accompany this dance, which the people from Oaxaca perform during the four days preceding the beginning of Lent; the dance starts on the previous Sunday and ends on Ash Wednesday.

It is performed by nine dancers, including women. Men use calabash rattles and wooden machetes (hunting knife), which they majestically handle during the dance; they wear trousers and shirts in different colours, flesh-coloured coats, shoes and socks, a scarf tied to their neck and a cone decorated with rooster feathers on their head. Women wear a woolen hat on their head; the upper part of their body is covered with a huipil and the lower part, with a pozahuanco (piece of cloth that is tied to the women’s hips, covering their legs).


DANCE OF THE TEJORONES

The dance of the Tejorones is performed during the Carnaval season. The dancers wear masks, worn out clothes and a cone decorated with rooster feathers on their head. Some of them represent animals such as the tiger, the cow and the dog. The mask of the tejoron has human features, which may be black or white, depending on the region where the dance takes place. Another character is Maria Candelaria, the Tejorones’s wife.

Like all the other dances in the Carnaval, the dance of the Tejorones breaks the rules, transgresses the status quo and gives free rein to sexual instinct. The Tejorones are insulted by all the children in town, who approach the dancers to bother them and then run away; the Tejorones react in a violent way: they insult, ridicule and catch men and women, ignoring taboos. The tiger is the one who has the power: he represents the evil and the forbidden, and the Tejorones are against him. He tries to catch them to rape them as men or women, imitating either a heterosexual or a homosexual coitus. The tiger jumps in all directions, plays with his tail and fights against the cow until the battle ends when one of them is raped. The Tejorones hold a rattle in their hands, and they also use a shotgun, a machete, a pistol and a rope.


DANCE OF THE TIGER

The tiger is an animal inspiring countless dances; one of the most spectacular versions of the Dance of the Tiger is the one performed in San Juan Colorado, located northernly from Santiago Pinotepa Nacional, in the State of Oaxaca.

This dance is about the hunting of a magic tiger, guided by a dog. It begins with the search for the tiger and when the dog finds it, it barks around the tree where the tiger is hiding. The hunters are accompanied by twelve dancers, who perform around the place where the tiger is. When the hunters shoot the tiger, they don’t harm it because it is magic. The dancers playing the dog and the tiger perform amazing steps and acrobatics, simulating a fight. Doña Catalina, the owner of the dog, gives some garlic to her husband for him to prepare his shotgun and break the spell. Finally, he kills the tiger, takes its skin off and throws it into a gully.

All the characters are played by male dancers. Their outfit consists of white cotton trousers, with colorful shorts over them; a loose-fitting shirt and two scarves; one of them goes on the dancers’ head and the other one in their hands. They also wear a hat decorated in colorful chaquira. The tiger wears a yellow dotted costume and a wooden mask with feline features, and it has mirrors on its eyes. The hunter wears chaps, a chamois vest and a hat; his wife wears a skirt, a shawl, a hat and an embroidered blouse with fringes hanging from the shoulders.


DANCE OF THE TOCOTINES

Tocotin is a restless dancer who jumps rhythmically.

The dance of the tocotines represents the arrival of the Spanish conquerors. This dance is performed during the celebrations from Mixtecos and Popolocas in the state of Veracruz.


DANCE OF THE TOREROS (BULLFIGHTERS)

In this dance, one of the dancers wears a hat with a figure of a small bull made of wood or straw on top, that’s why it is called the “dance of the bullfighters”. In some regions, the toreros (“bullfighters”) wear a charro costume and perform steps regarding the fiesta brava (bullfighting).


DANCE OF THE TOREADORES

The indigenous people were not allowed to fight real bulls, therefore they decided to fight, festively, wooden or cardboard bulls. That’s the way this dance originated. It was also influenced by the racy bullfights that circus performers and comic actors occasionally performed in town.


DANCE OF THE TORO PETATE

This dance was first performed in Santiago Collantes, Oaxaca, in 1911 in honour of Francisco I. Madero, who was the president of Mexico in those days.

The characters in this dance are the bull, the charge hands and their chief, Don Francisco or Pancho, his wife Maria Dominguez or the Minga and their daughter.

The charge hands dance around the bull, who is always at the center; the chief of the charge hands and Don Pancho dance with the Minga. The charge hands make a circle and recite funny poems. At the end of the dance they must fight the bull and defeat him.

The man that plays the bull hides under a structure of reed that is covered with petates. The charge hands wear knee-lenght trousers and bright-coloured shirts with colorful paper strips hanging behind them. They also wear a ribbon with a bow on their chest. Besides the rope they use to tie the bull, they wear hats decorated with a bright cloth and four mirrors. The chief of the charge hands wears a different hat, chaps, a binza (a leather whip) and a false machete, which hangs from his right shoulder.

Don Pancho wears a mask representing a white man, having an aquiline nose and a long white beard. His wife is played by a man wearing a female mask; it represents a white woman, having blue eyes and reddish hair. The Minga wears a long skirt and a bright-coloured blouse. Her daughter is a doll draped in a shawl.

The instruments accompanying this dance are two trumpets, two saxophones and a drum.


DANCE OF THE TURTLE

The turtle is a recurrent element in mexican dances, specially in those coming from the coastline towns where the afro-mixed population is bigger.

This dance is performed by 14 men: a Pancho, a main Minga, 6 foremen and their 6 Mingas. The Pancho represents a Spanish man who carries a whip, and the foremen, as Pancho trusts them, are also allowed to carry a whip, even if they are afro-mixed. The main Minga is the Pancho’s wife; she dances and flirts with everyone in order to be kissed and make his husband jealous. The Minga holds a doll in her hands, as if it were her daughter, and she wants everybody to hug her. If someone refuses to hold the doll, the Minga tells her husband and he will be in charge of punishing the snub, but if they accept the doll, the Pancho gets jealous and angry, and also punishes them. This punishment consists of dancing with the Minga. Those who don’t want to do it will have to donate money or something valuable which will later be used to buy alcoholic drinks for the dancers. At the end of the dance, the Pancho approaches the turtle and this character lays some eggs that Pancho will give the special guests.

All the dancers wear a mask. Women wear flowery ankle-lenght dresses with a black lace cloth over them. They also wear sandals and stockings. All the women, with the exception of the main Minga, cover their head with a piece of cloth. The Minga, who is the main lady wears a more elegant dress and a shawl crossed over her chest where she carries the doll representing her daughter. She also wears a wig and high-heeled shoes. The men’s outfits consist of old, frayed clothes. They wear hats, scarves and sandals. The Pancho wears chaps and spurred boots. He has a rope, a cow’s horn on his shoulder and a binza (a leather whip). The turtle’s costume consists of a wooden shell-like frame which is covered with cloth.


DANCE OF TSACAM SON

This dance comes from the Huasteca region. When the indigenous people perform it, they dedicate it to the four winds and to Mother Earth in order to thank them for the favours they have received. During the dance, before drinking the customary sugar cane nectar, they throw a little to the ground because they want Mother Earth to be the first one to drink it.

The dancers’ outfit consists of white calico shirt and trousers; they wear a blue square tied to their neck, and another square that is made of yellow cloth and has three colorful ribbons on their head; also, a cedar board where a tree is drawn is placed on their front. The meaning of this tree is related to the name of Akich mon (Aquismon), a well located under a guasima tree.

The dancers are barefoot and, on their right hand, they hold a chinchin or rattle with colorful feathers; this instrument is made of a guaje and k’uhuap seeds. The chief signals with the kutsil’e, a bundle of sticks with turkey feathers painted in pink, representing a bunch of flowers.

Women also accompany the dancers; they are barefoot, wear a black or mourning skirt called nagua and a white calico blouse decorated with a flounce and an embroidered quexquemitl, where the prevailing colour is red. They use a large amount of worsted, called petop, to braid their hair; they wear colorful earrings and necklaces, a woven purse called talega and a bowl, which is made from the same fruit as the chinchin (guaje) and is painted basically in red.

Regarding music, some string instruments are used: a cedar harp and a rabel (small violin) also made of cedar wood, which the dancers make themselves. The dance consists of more than 75 songs; some of them are performed in the morning, others in the afternoon and others at dawn. Different steps are performed in each one of the songs. This dance is also known as la Brincona, because it is very dynamic and lively.


DANCE OF THE STICKS

There are many versions on the dance of “The Sticks”, but the most popular is the one from the region of the Huasteca. From its origins, this dance was the most beautiful one and nowadays it has become commercialized and therefore falsely spectacular. There is a version combining several features of different dances of the “sticks” in the Huasteca and Nahuatl regions; this is the “Dance of the Sticks from Coatzatlan”.

The dance is part of a fiesta that begins early in the morning by playing lively songs, and, when the day ends, sad songs are played in order to say good bye to the father, the Sun. The strongest songs are played at night. These are danced by making two lines and a circle, to imitate the flight of the swallows around the sun; the steps are sometimes dynamic and sometimes slow, always imitating the animals’ movements and creating figures by turning and spinning.

The most important character in the celebration is the traditional viejo or “old man” who has gained everyone’s respect. All the songs are named after animals or after daily life events, such as: El son del conejito (song of the little rabbit), el son del caballito (song of the little horse), flor de enredadera (climbing plant), entrada (going in), salida (going out), etc.

The dancers wear calico shirt and trousers and four red scarves: two of them are tied to the front and to the back and the other two hang from the dancer’s waist; they also wear a conical hat with a red fan on top. They hold a wooden knife in their right hand, while in the left one they carry a stick decorated with ribbons in different colours (yellow, red, orange, white, blue and green). A band with small bells is tied to their knees and they are barefoot. The old man’s outfit is similar, but he doesn’t have a stick or a knife, his head is covered with cotton, simulating gray hair and he holds a white walking stick with black spiral figures in each one of his hands; he uses these walking sticks to keep his hunched position. He wears a mask that is completely painted in white and has an aquiline nose. The musical instruments are a double-patched drum made of jabali (wild boar) leather and a reed flute.