Compadritos. Jorge Luis Borges. Juan José Sebreli. Rubén Darío. Lunfardismos.
Everything mentioned above are terms and people associated with tango, the popular dance Miami University students were able to learn about firsthand last Thursday at a lecture given by Argentine native Noemí Ulla.
The lecture was organized by Charles Victor Ganelin, chair and professor of the department of Spanish and Portuguese at Miami.
Originally from Santa Fe, Argentina, Ulla is a novelist, short story writer and literary critic.
Ganelin met Ulla in 2003 in Buenos Aires. Ganelin's wife, Patricia Klingenberg (also a professor in Miami's department of Spanish and Portuguese) had met Ulla a few years before at a conference in Argentina.
From that moment, Ganelin and his wife knew that Ulla would be an excellent choice to speak at Miami. Ulla accepted their offer, with Thursday's visit being her first to the United States.
The lecture, given in Spanish with an English translation on an accompanying PowerPoint slideshow, gave the students in attendance the history of tango as well as insights into the culture of Argentina.
Ulla spoke about Argentina's history, beginning in the 1870s and 1880s when the first tango songs were heard. She went into detail on the specific lyrics of the tango songs and how they relate to the history, pointing out that they span a variety of topics, from pornography, romance and even political cynicism.
Ulla said that tango music and dance first originated in smaller cities, but was eventually brought to more central locales. It was the "carnavals," or festivals, that truly contributed to the spread of the tango as a dance form throughout Argentina.
"Tango is a very important aspect of Argentine popular culture," Ulla said. "For several years it has become much more widely known."
Ulla has written a novel on the dance form, as well as several essays and seven short story collections. The short stories that she has written have been translated into French, English, Italian and German.
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Ulla studied in Rosario, Argentina, and received her Ph.D from the University of Buenos Aires.
In addition to the lecture, Miami's UniDiversity committee put on a "milonga," or dance, Friday evening in the lower level of Alexander Dining Hall.
"UniDiversity is a two-month long series," Ganelin said, via e-mail. "There are lectures in various fields, including Latin American studies, biology, ecology, history ... it varies from year to year."
Ganelin said that this year they wanted to introduce the student body, faculty and community to one of South America and Argentina's original dances.
"We had about 50 participants for the tango demonstration and lesson," Ganelin said. "The dancers, from Tango del Barrio in Cincinnati, exhibited four kinds of tango, talked a bit about styles of dancing, and then gave a basic lesson to everyone, followed by dancing."
Ganelin also said that the students were enthusiastic about the class, despite the fact that tango was new to most of them.
Support for the event came from the department of Spanish and Portuguese, the Center for American and World Cultures and the School of Fine Arts.
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