The digitally enhanced version of A History of Gambyong from Folk Art to Classical Dance is finally out from Emory Center for Digital Scholarship!
An English translation and abridged version of Dr. Sri Rochana Widyastutieningrum’s Sejarah Tari Gambyong: Seni Rakyat Munuju Istana (2004) was published in the journal, Ethnomusicology Translations No.14 (2024). This digitally enhanced version includes not only the text, but also photographs of dancers and detailed elements of costumes as well as video and audio recordings of Gambyong performances and choreographic movements.
Manifold offers multimedia features that aren’t possible in a traditional monograph, and the History of Gambyong digital edition features over 45 videos of traditional dance, along with a selection of high-quality professional photographs of the dancers. Through creating this enhanced digital edition with ECDS, Emory Music Professor Maho Ishiguro and her colleagues translated Sri Rochana Widyastutieningrum’s original works into English, and presented her scholarship to the American classrooms as a rare resource for learning about the Indonesian dance forms and their cultural contexts.
The translation team includes Xin Wei Thow, Rajendra Amira L.S. and Maho Ishiguro, assistant professor of ethnomusicology at Emory. The dancers are Sonia Pangesti Lambangsari and Tumuruning Nur Rahayu Lestari.
Special thanks goes to Ndalem Sunartan for contributing some of the performance videos in the publication, and Emory Center for Digital Scholarship’s Yang Li and Steve Bransford for assisting every step of the way and making this publication possible.
Explore the open-access Manifold book here and watch the Gambyong Pangkur performed by Tumuruning Nur Rahayu Lestari below or at this link.