Rhythm & Power: Performing Salsa in Puerto Rican and Latino Communities

The story of New York salsa—an up-tempo performance of percussive Latin music and Afro-Caribbean-infused dance—is one of cultural fusion, artistry, and skilled marketing. A multi-disciplinary collective of scholars illuminate how immigrant and migrant communities in New York City—most notably from Puerto Rico—nurtured and developed salsa, growing it from a local movement playing out in the city’s streets and clubs into a global phenomenon. The parameters of the work is expansive as it includes the numerous cultural influences of salsa as it is practiced in New York City and Puerto Rico. The papers interrogate the role of record companies and stores in supporting and promoting the 1970s salsa movement, the ways Puerto Rican nationalism and the Nuyorican Movement continue to influence lyrical content, the hybridization of dance styles, and pay close attention to the circular flows of people and ideas traveling between NYC and the Caribbean. _________ “Salsa music and dance is a powerfully vibrant and uncontainable cultural expression that emerged from the barrios of New York City in the 1960s. Coming at the forefront of political and racial strife in the U.S., salsa initially articulated the voice and cultural experience of an often unheard and disenfranchised Puerto Rican and Latino peoples. Though historically salsa was “bounded” by the confines of the barrios in New York City, over time its popularity transcended those original city blocks as Hispanic populations grew throughout the U.S. and the music began appealing to a growing international market. This diverse group of scholars explore the implications of this global movement. This innovative volume embraces new interdisciplinary examinations focused on the ways the rhythm and power of salsa music and dance remain emergent, celebrated, and transformational even in our current turbulent moment.” Christopher Washburne (Columbia University), author of Sounding Salsa: Performing Latin Music in New York City.