SALSA – A TRANSNATIONAL PHENOMENON

Salsa, a dance and music style, is a transnational phenomenon. While there are discussions concerning its territorial origin, scholars usually agree that “even in its ‘birthplaces’, Salsa has always been deterritorialised: the history of Salsa involves such intricate transnational connections that it is difficult to pinpoint its ‘original’ location” (Pietrobruno Reference Pietrobruno2006:20). Thus Salsa is a “trans” phenomenon in the first place, cultural roots of its rhythms and melodies cross not only the Caribbean region and many parts of the Americas but are furthermore transatlantic as a lot of its features relate to heritages of slavery in the Caribbean and thus stem from African traditions. Further, there are elements of Jazz music that have had an influence on Salsa (for a concise history of Salsa see Pietrobruno Reference Pietrobruno2006:chap. 1; Waxer Reference Waxer and Waxer2002).

The emergence of Salsa in the 1970s is linked to political discourses, where people of Latin American descent (mainly Puerto Ricans) in New York, fighting for the just treatment of Latinos, tried to develop a pan-Latin consciousness in cultural roots in order to express identity and pride (Pietrobruno Reference Pietrobruno2006:50). Salsa's multiple and political history contrasts with many mainstream conceptions of Salsa in the US, in Europe and also in Australia. Here, its hybrid nature often becomes invisible; it is mainly commercialised versions of the music, also called Salsa Romántica, that are listened to, while older songs with political contents are mostly unknown and newer versions, which integrate Hip Hop rhythms and other contemporary musical elements, are refused as unauthentic.

Salsa dancers, schools, parties, conventions, clubs, meetings, etc. can now be found in many regions of the world, as in the USA, in Europe, in Japan, in some African countries, such as Congo (Hosokawa Reference Hosokawa1997), and also in Australia. It is particularly the dance that has gained popularity worldwide and has entered the music scene and nightlife in many parts of the world. Salsa identities in these scenes convey a certain lifestyle, connected to images of happiness, sensuality and emotionality. In many contexts, stereotypical images of “Latin” life, as created by commercial agents from the realm of music and tourism, can be found. In geographical contexts outside Latin America, many migrants of Latin American descent adopt a pan-“Latin”Footnote ¹ identity only after having arrived in the host country (see e.g. Papadopulos Reference Papadopulos, Bergmann and Römhild2003, Waxer Reference Waxer and Waxer2002). The construction of “Latinness” partly relies on heterosexual gender identity (see below) and visual codes and partly on language use. Lyrics of Salsa songs are mostly – yet not always – in Spanish. The language and also the rhythms of Salsa connect to a transnational “Latin” identity (Aparicio & Jáquez Reference Aparicio and Jáquez2003; Pietrobruno Reference Pietrobruno2006:17; Waxer Reference Waxer and Waxer2002). However, the values and meanings attached to Salsa dancing, the Spanish language, the styles of dancing and the reproduced elements of Latin culture differ strongly in the particular re-locations (see Robertson Reference Robertson and Beck1998) of the cultural phenomenon in different parts of the world. In contrast to other transnationally adopted cultural practices (as, e.g. Yoga or Kung Fu), Salsa, through the lyrics of songs, very often involves exposure to the “original” language of the countries of origin of the music. It is thus an interesting phenomenon to study the diverse effects of transnational culture on language ideology.

In this paper, a study of Salsa Communities of Practice in Sydney, Australia, is introduced. Australia was chosen as national environment as its status as an immigration country, officially transcending ideologies of ethnic belonging (see e.g. Commonwealth of Australia 2003), seems particularly enlightening for studying relocations of transnational culture. The re-location of Salsa culture is not only different in different countries but also differs significantly on very local levels, which can be far below the size of a city. The Salsa CofPs of Sydney relate to different styles of Salsa dance, which differ technically, in terms of dance moves, but also in their histories and developments. The dance styles and CofPs have become indexical of particular ideological trajectories and carry different relations to language, nation, class, ethnicity and globalization. These relations are elucidating in gaining insights into post-national linguistic identities and the development of language ideologies in transnational culture. In order to study such developments, Communities of Practice are useful units of analysis as the circular reproduction of essentialist categories such as citizenship, country of origin or mother tongue can be avoided (Barton & Tusting Reference Barton and Tusting2005; Eckert & McConnell-Ginet Reference Eckert, McConnell-Ginet and Coates1998; Holmes & Meyerhoff Reference Holmes and Meyerhoff1999; Rampton Reference Rampton2000a).

The languages used in Salsa contexts differ according to the national environments; yet, next to the usage of Spanish in lyrics, empirical observation indicates that in some Salsa CofPs, people are not only interested in dance but also in the culture and language of its origin (see Papadopulos Reference Papadopulos, Bergmann and Römhild2003; Schneider Reference Schneider, Stevenson and Carl2009 for the German case; Pietrobruno Reference Pietrobruno2006 for the Canadian case). In these communities, there are many enthusiastic learners of Spanish who, to a certain extent, identify with the language. This enthusiasm for language learning does neither stem from their ethnic heritage nor from instrumental considerations, as for example enhanced job opportunities. It is especially individuals who adopt practices that cross traditional (native) linguistic identities who make such Salsa CofPs a highly interesting example of cultural and linguistic development in transnational cultural contexts. Adding to that, there are also native Spanish speakers who are visible, active and also central members in some of the multiethnic CofPs, which makes the study of the Salsa phenomenon also vital in studying linguistic and cultural contact zones (Pratt Reference Pratt, Fabb, Attridge, Durant and MacCabe1987:60; Rampton Reference Rampton2000a).

Before returning to the social meanings of different dance styles in Sydney in more detail, a short outline of poststructural approaches to identity, as embedded in ideologies and discourses, will serve as background for the empirical analysis.

DISCOURSE, LANGUAGE AND IDENTITY

In contemporary poststructural theory, identities, ideologies and social reality itself are understood as developed in interaction and as the historical result of societal discourse (see e.g. Berger & Luckmann Reference Berger and Luckmann1987; Blackledge & Pavlenko Reference Blackledge and Pavlenko2001; Butler Reference Butler1990; Butler Reference Butler, Gergen and Gergen2003; De Fina, Schiffrin & Bamberg Reference De Fina, Schiffrin and Bamberg2006; Djité Reference Djité2006; Gay, Evans & Redman Reference Gay, Evans and Redman2000; Hall Reference Hall, Gay, Evans and Redman2000; Joseph Reference Joseph2004; Le Page & Tabouret-Keller Reference Le Page and Tabouret-Keller1985; Pavlenko & Blackledge Reference Pavlenko, Blackledge, Pavlenko and Blackledge2004). Taking identity – concepts for categorising individuals into groups – as an example for the general perspective of discursive approaches to social reality, it becomes obvious that identities (as well as other categories) are not given or simply inherited. Although there are certain types of identity that are hard to negotiate in our everyday practice and often presented as given (see also Pavlenko & Blackledge Reference Pavlenko, Blackledge, Pavlenko and Blackledge2004), for example gender or ethnic identity, poststructural approaches to identity emphasise that no category is simply existent or natural. It is through the constant performance of an identity, of its associated ways of dressing, moving or speaking – through its “doing” – that it is reproduced and maintained (Butler Reference Butler1990). In this view, any concept or category is seen as constituted within social, historically developed discourses that norm behaviour and thought in relation to societal power struggles and ideologiesFootnote ² (Foucault Reference Foucault1973, 1978 (Reference Foucault, Bröckling, Krassmann and Lemke2000)).Footnote ³

Next to identities, within the study of language ideology (see e.g. Kroskrity Reference Kroskrity and Kroskrity2000; Woolard Reference Woolard, Schieffelin, Woolard and Kroskrity1998), the concept of language as given entity is also often questioned and understood as discursively constructed (see e.g. Gal & Irvine Reference Gal and Irvine1995; Makoni & Pennycook Reference Makoni, Pennycook, Makoni and Pennycook2007). The term language, in its understanding as a differentiable, bounded object, as “Spanish”, “German” or “English”, is also seen as the result of historical discourses that have constructed the object language in line with interests of nations, whose existence often partially relies on this construction (e.g. Blommaert & Verschueren Reference Blommaert, Verschueren, Schieffelin, Woolard and Kroskrity1998) 3. Likewise, the term multilingualism should be understood as a contingent discursive construct embedded in a certain social and historical environment.

The actual study of the discourses that construct language, identity and multilingualism in a particular way, as it is presented here, is based on an ethnographic approach which is not so much interested in the language use of Salseras and Salseros but more in the formation of the different communities and the different discourses on language and identity that exist within them. Expert interviews with the members of the scene – dance teachers, regular participants of Salsa events, organisers of Salsa events – provide the main source of information. In total, 16 interviews have been conducted in two different communities based on Salsa and with informants from the Colombian community of Sydney. Note that despite the emphasis on the relational, non-essentialist character of groups, traditional categories like nation and ethnicity remain vital and ethnic identities of informants will be mentioned if considered relevant. In this article, I focus on “expert interviews” (Bogner & Menz Reference Bogner, Menz, Bogner, Littig and Menz2005), interviews with professional Salsa teachers and dance school owners and will leave aside the data from the ethnic, Colombian communities of Sydney.

The interviews have been accompanied by participant observation (attendance of dance classes, Salsa events in clubs and at festivals, membership in relevant newsgroups), observation of Internet resources and several unrecorded, more informal conversations have taken place. Participants have been informed about the aim of the interviews and talks and gave their consent to publication of the insights gained through observation and analysis. For reasons of privacy, I do not mention the name of the dance schools and interviewees. The analysis is informed by ethnography, with a focus on an analysis of the interview contents. As implicit discourses influence the being and acting of informants, elements from several approaches of discourse analysis (see e.g. Cameron Reference Cameron2001) are taken as analytical tools to complement the ethnographic approach.

The perspective from which the communities are analysed is, necessarily, contingent and depends on the researcher's own ethnic and gender identity. As in other national environments (for Canada see Pietrobruno Reference Pietrobruno2006; for Germany, see Schneider Reference Schneider, Stevenson and Carl2009), the identity formation of Salsero or Salsera in Sydney expresses a strong heteronormativity (Wagenknecht Reference Wagenknecht, Hartmann, Klesse, Wagenknecht, Fritzsche and Hackmann2007), where female and male identities are strictly separated and sexualised. This expression of sexualised and traditional gender identities is part of the success story of Salsa, while the reasons for that have to be discussed elsewhere (see Schneider Reference Schneider, Stevenson and Carl2009). As a female researcher who appeals to the ideals of feminism, especially in the beginning of the research phase, these identity performances brought along a relatively high degree of emotional distance between me and the field. As I was not a Salsa dancer before I started the study, my predominantly academic interest in Salsa, obviously, will also have effects on the view on Salsa as it is presented here.

SALSA IN SYDNEY

Approaching Salsa in Sydney as an outsider, the number of posters and flyers that are found in the inner city area, or the Central Business District (CBD), of Sydney is impressive. Also, there is a large number of Internet resources that give access to dates and locations of Salsa events, newsgroups and also “meet-up groups” where people arrange meetings and parties via the Internet.

The language of the products and communication materials of the Salsa CofPs in Sydney is usually English but there are often single words or expressions in Spanish (e.g. fiesta [party], picante [spicy], noche [night]). Yet, as has already been mentioned above, in general, the role of the Spanish language differs in different CofPs. Multilingual and monolingual identities can be related to different Salsa-scenes and, as this study brought to the fore, it is possible to distinguish different communities of Salsa practice in central Sydney with different language ideologies.Footnote ⁴ In the following, I will concentrate on two of these communities that show particularly illuminating differences in language ideology that relate to different ideologies on authenticity, competition and commodification, which are all vital issues in the study of transnational culture.

COMPETITIVE SALSA – “YOU DON'T NEED TO BE ITALIAN TO MAKE A GOOD PIZZA”

First of all, there is a Salsa CofP that I call the “competitive” community. It is the biggest and most visible CofP in Sydney. Posters regarding the major events are found everywhere in the centre of town; it is easy to find dance schools of this type on the Internet, parties are major events that take place in elaborate and expensive venues in the Central Business District. As a result, this community is most likely to be the first one that an outsider gets into contact with – as it happened to me in this research project. Due to my own particular, national and local background, where Salsa's appeal depends on its ties to an imagined “Latin” culture (Frankfurt, Germany), the absence of images that express Latinness on posters and websites that relate to this CofP struck me as unusual in the beginning. As this field note on my impressions in front of a L.A. Style party venue demonstrates, the visual design of the parties, places and people does not relate to Latin culture:

The visual style has to do with the style of Salsa as it is practiced in this CofP. It is called L.A. Style Salsa and has been developed in the transnational Latin context of Los Angeles, U.S.A. (Pietrobruno Reference Pietrobruno2006:66). It is influenced by Puerto Rican Salsa, swing and ballroom dances and has showy moves and cabaret gestures (ibid.). The influence of ballroom dance is characteristic of this style; which at the same time makes it more accessible to a Western public. While other Salsa styles display far more body contact, couples dancing L.A. Style usually do not touch each other, only their arms and hands get into contact. Because of the influence of ballroom dance, the steps and turns of L.A. Style are relatively elaborate, complicated and technical. Whereas other styles are usually not performed in front of an audience, L.A. Style is also danced in global competitions so that the style has a strong performance aspect.

This type of Salsa attracts a particular audience. All members of the community that I meet in dance classes and parties are “white”Footnote ⁵ and Asian Australians. The general public here can be described as white-collar educated middle class; most interviewees and other informants work in some kind of office, in banks, insurance companies or advertising agencies. Their looks and attitudes are those of the Anglo-Australian majority society. Consequently, L.A. Style Salsa parties exemplify expensive, stylish looks, which, especially in the clothing of participants, mirrors majority Australian culture, in which nightlife audiences often wear this type of apparel. In contrast to my own presumptions, for the dancers of L.A. Style in Sydney, Salsa dancing is not based on an “authentic”Footnote ⁶ cultural experience of Latin culture. As my informants explained to me, the focus and motivation is here on the dance steps and the development of elaborate dance skill, rather than on a cultural experience with the “Other”.

The dance classes that I attended in this community are thus related to other majority activities of Australia, where sports take a prominent place. The classes take place in a community gym and do not share the stylish looks of the dance parties but have the atmosphere of a fitness class. The main emphasis in the class is on the techniques of the steps, and as the class is very big (about 40 people) it is, at least for me, very hard to follow the instructions. Dancing Salsa is here represented as the ability to follow formal instructions on choreography. The strong emphasis on dance skills has effects not only on the overall competitive nature of this type of Salsa but also on the language ideology of the community.

In Sydney's competitive Salsa CofP, people neither learn Spanish, nor do native speakers of Spanish participate in that community. English is the normalised medium of communication; for example, no Spanish names for dance moves are used in the classes I observe. This monolingual language ideology is related to various factors. As Salsa, after all, stems from a Latin cultural context and as, in other CofPs, it usually appeals also to people of Latin American heritage, the complete absence of Spanish-speakers is remarkable in a city like Sydney, where Spanish is the 7^th most widely spoken minority language (Australian Bureau of Statistics 2007). When asked about the role of Spanish-speakers and why they are so remarkably absent in this CofP, an informant, himself a Salsa teacher of Arab descent, is eager to express the ethnically inclusive nature of Salsa dance in Sydney:

Obviously, there are other items, traits and actions than cultural authenticity that are important in gaining status in this context. Considering the strength of ethnicity or nationality in marking borders in many other environments (Barth Reference Barth and Fredrik1969), this attitude is indeed truly inclusive. It is not assumed that cultural genuineness leads to acceptance within the scene but rather the ability to dance. Yet, the remarkable nonattendance of Spanish and Spanish-speakers that I observed during my fieldwork suggests that national/ethnic identity seems to be of relevance, albeit in an unexpected fashion. In contrast to my preceding assumptions, Latin descent seems rather to function as obstruction than as incentive in becoming a member of the L.A. Style community. While informants of the community maintain that the popularity of the dance and music is rooted in its Latinness, the people of Latin decent are represented as lacking skill on various levels.

First of all, Sydneysiders with Latin American background often dance a different style of Salsa. A dance teacher, of Hungarian descent, refers to Colombian Style, a variety of Salsa mainly practiced in Colombia but also by a lot of people in the ethnic communities of Sydney, as

Furthermore, she maintains that this style, being simpler in terms of technique, is not “real Salsa” but something that

Next to the perceived backwardness of the dance style, the failure to commodify Salsa in the local economy is seen as a further reason for the lack of Latin people in L.A. Style Salsa. One informant is of Chinese heritage and learned to dance from Colombians in Sydney. He is now engaged in leading one of Sydney's biggest dance schools and explains that the reason why people of Latin American descent do not participate in this community is their lack of technicality and professionalismFootnote ⁷:

The informant criticises Latin American Salsa dancers, who obviously assume that dancing is learned by imitation – which is how it is done in Colombia, where the dancers originated from. In Colombia and in the Colombian community settings of Sydney, there is no formal instruction and the dance is acquired at a very young age (Pietrobruno Reference Pietrobruno2006:3). The informant admits that “they” (“the Latin people”) consider their culture to be important but fail in transmitting their knowledge to others in an understandable way. It is especially the lack of a systematic analysis of the dance steps that the informant criticises, as outsiders, according to the interviewee are unable to learn the dance. The rising tone at the end of line 3, making the passage sound like a question, is a typical Australian intonation in narrative talk that seems to emphasise the utterance in seeking agreement with the interviewer. This, together with the long pause before the word “technical”, can be interpreted as the expression of a critical stance that is taken towards Latin American Salsa dancers who simply engage in dancing but cannot explain verbally how they actually do it. This is again mentioned at the end of the passage, where the informant concludes that “they” are not technical, this time using the present tense, making the essentialist claim even stronger.

The fact that dancing Salsa within a local community in Colombia is embedded in a different cultural context, with different cultural values (which maybe needs a longer time to get acquainted with as it implies more than just the techniques of dance steps), seems to go unnoticed as it is only the dance steps that the informant focuses on. Consequently, he and his “business partner” – the other leader of the dance school – not only systematically analysed the dance steps, they furthermore broke down whole movements into smaller sections, as he says, “stripping down things in a very detailed way”, before they developed a method of teaching these steps, implementing several “levels” according to which their dance classes are structured.

Salsa, in a version that has been created in the U.S. context, is seen as commodity to be sold to an audience that has the means to afford an evening in an expensive inner-city venue. This approach to culture is tied to discourses of capitalism, where culture itself, from material to immaterial traits to cultural practices, is considered in its capacity to be sold and consumed. The discourses seem to enforce ethnic discrimination in which the non-commercialising forms of Salsa as practiced by Latin Americans are seen as failure and backwardness.

Of course, this approach has to be understood in the context of a competitive market economy, where the informants may have to compensate for their lack of authentic cultural background. Additionally, the mainstream mentality in Sydney's inner city suburbs is in general very approving of people who adhere to the competitive values of the market economy. Interestingly, this business mentality is closely related to the usage of English.

The Spanish language is absent in the classy parties I attended and also in the dance classes. There are some instances where Spanish language “tokens” are used on flyers for parties (especially the term fiesta occurs) and the terms for other dances are kept in Spanish (Merengue, Bachata, both dances which are also popular with Salsa dancers). Other than that, no usage of Spanish can be documented. As has been mentioned, in the classes that I attended, the instructions of the dance moves, if they existed before they were adapted to the needs of “customers” of this variety of the dance, have been translated into English so that, according to the Arab dance instructor:

Even though the majority of informants here are bilingual themselves, and have native languages such as German, Hungarian, Mandarin, Arabic, etc., it is self-evident for them that everybody speaks English and only English. During the interviews, when asked about the role of Spanish, informants did not seem to understand the question; they do not see a point in speaking or learning Spanish, as nobody does so in their local social environment. When asked if Spanish plays any role at all in the community, the only reason that is mentioned is that it would give access to the lyrics of the songs. But then, the dance instructor of Hungarian descent assumes that

The hegemony of English in this context is illuminating. The language seems to be connected to ideologies of commercialism and capitalist success. Although not spelled out explicitly, language is here only seen in its “usefulness”, as a tool or instrument that conveys information; the ability of language to convey other levels of meaning, especially its ability to perform functions related to identity, become invisible. Invisible are also the many indigenous languages of Australia and the fact that most of the members of this CofP are actually (at least) bilingual themselves. English seems to be the unmarked norm that functions in a discursive environment that promotes economic success. Of course, the discourses of this community are also tied to a national discourse in which participation in the Australian society is considered to be at least difficult without a near native-like competence of English (see e.g. Clyne Reference Clyne2005). As many informants belong to the first generation of migrants to Australia, their language ideologies also have to be reflected in the light of a relatively strong Australian monolingual language discourse that is imposed on recent immigrants.

Spanish, although omnipresent, seems to function more like a brand, rather than as expression of culture or identity. Expressions like Fiesta or Una noche de Salsa remind of the marketing strategies of multinational companies such as “Bacardi” for the “Bacardi Feeling” (Bacardi image campaign 2008). The CofP thus belongs to a global capitalist discourse in which ethnic identity is rendered invisible and subordinated to the logic of commercialism. Simultaneously, Australian mainstream attitudes are reproduced, with their emphasis on ethnic inclusiveness – “You don't need to be Italian to make a good pizza” – but which strongly normalise the usage of English.

There is, however, another community of Salsa-lovers in Sydney, where some dancers with an ethnic Latin background use their “authentic” background as a resource. On the local dance school market of Sydney, this community serves a demand of different “customers” of Salsa who use knowledge of “other” cultures and languages to produce globalised elite identities.

COSMOPOLITAN SALSA – “EVERYBODY SPEAKS SPANISH HERE”

My first contact with the Cuban Style dance school, which is the centre of the second Community of Practice that I introduce here, is through a tiny flyer that I find attached to a road sign, close to the Central Railway Station. The dance studio is located in a loft in a small and dark street close to where I found the flyer. The area is a poor neighbourhood that is most likely to be gentrified within the next years due to its central location. The atmosphere of this school provokes stereotypical images of the poor but passionate dancer as found in Hollywood movies such as “Flashdance”. The logo of the school, a red star, relates to Cuba and its Communist regime; but it is not only political connotations on which this image is based, it is also because the school offers classes in Cuban Style Salsa. As will become clear in the following, Salsa dancing within this CofP is related to very different ideologies than in the L.A. Style environment.

Although the school also offers lessons in L.A. Style – the founder of the school has a background in European dance and likes both styles – it is the specialty of the school that it offers classes in Cuban Style. There are only two schools in Sydney that I can find that offer this style. Students of L.A. Style from my data set are not aware that there are other styles than L.A. and thus do not know Cuban Style. From the looks and symbols, the location and the dance style, the Cuban Style community has to be considered a sub-culture in the Sydney context. However, professional dancers do know that different styles exist. The L.A. Style teacher of Hungarian descent referred me to the owner of this dance school when I asked about people who dance Salsa and speak Spanish. There are contacts between the different schools through public events like the Latin Fiesta, which is a festival organised by the council of Sydney that promotes Latin culture and takes place annually at Darling Harbour in the centre of the city (http://www.sydneyfestivals.com.au/darling-harbour-fiesta.htm).

An obvious difference between L.A. and Cuban Style is the outward appearance of dancers. Clothing is a lot more casual than in the mainstream CofP. The dressy style of the L.A. CofP contrasts with the jeans and t-shirts that are worn here. The casualty of clothing, the slightly shabby impression of the location, and the red stars that are found on flyers and posters in connection with the interest in Cuban dance express a more relaxed atmosphere. It might also be interpreted as expressing a relation to left-wing discourses, where commercialism is criticised and communist/socialist ideologies are approached with a relatively positive attitude.

A more relaxed attitude is also indexed by the dance style. While L.A. Style concentrates on intricate foot choreographies, Cuban Style Salsa focuses on the movements of the body as a whole. Dance teachers emphasise that everybody has their own way of moving. Complicated steps and turns, as produced in L.A. Style Salsa, are also found but “holistic body movements”, as a teacher of this style describes it, are very important. Furthermore, the couple engages in circular movements while dancing, whereas L.A. Style is danced “on the line”; the couple here always remains on an imagined straight line, which furthers an impression of accurateness. Members of the Cuban Style community express a determined differentiation from the competitive style, as can be inferred from the following passage from an interview with a Cuban Style dance teacher. The dance teacher is of Chilean heritage and relates his political (left-wing) aspirations to his love for Salsa. As L.A. Style dancers show no interest in the political and cultural history of Salsa, he disapproves of this style:

As this teacher is aware of the political background of Salsa, he criticises the cultural detachment that is produced within the practice of L.A. Style; later on he describes L.A. Style as “technical” and “controlled”, which for him has negative connotations. The issue of authenticity also seems to be important here, the interviewee talks about “the roots”, the cultural and social origins of Salsa. It is important for him to see Salsa as embedded in its social, political and cultural history and a boundary is marked towards the people who only learn the techniques of steps. The opposing relationship between L.A. Style and Cuban Style Salsa is linked to discourses of the wider Australian national context, where the adoption of a capitalist attitude belongs to the dominant values. One Cuban dance student thus describes L.A. Style Salsa, as it is practiced in the CofP introduced above, as “McDonald's Salsa”. Dancing Cuban Salsa expresses a differentiation from dancers of L.A. Style but also from mainstream capitalist Australian values. The usage of non-Anglo features of ethnicity and language seems to be crucial in Cuban Style dancers' performance of an identity that differs from L.A. Style dancers and thus simultaneously from national mainstream competitive values and English monolingualism.

Although people of many ethnic backgrounds intermingle in the L.A. Style CofP, the Cuban Style CofP is different in that the celebration of ethnic originality is an important aspect. “Real” Latin Americans consciously emphasise their ethnic descent in their identity performance by using Spanish greeting formulae and Spanish names. Members of this CofP are usually aware of who is “really” Latin American and being “real” or having contact with “real” Spanish-speakers is of high value. This is confirmed by the fact that this dance school deliberately employs Latin Americans, even though their ethnic background does not mean that they necessarily have learned Salsa as part of their heritage culture. The dance class that I attended in this school was given by two teachers of Cuban descent. Although the overall structure of the class is the same as in the L.A. Style class, the atmosphere is very different. Not only is the location different from a gym, the class is a lot smaller (there are only 10 people) and, accordingly, the instructions are a lot more personal. During the class, the dance teachers chat with each other and also with the students. All students are greeted with kisses on the cheeks. While this expresses the more personal relationship between students and teachers, it also involves the students in a culturally “other” environment. Cuban Style students state that this is the actual reason why they learn Salsa:

Interestingly, it is also mentioned that Anglo-Australian Cuban Style students often acquire the language first or travel to South America and then started to learn Salsa, while students of L.A. Style usually come into contact with the community within Sydney. Thus, within Sydney, dancing Cuban Style also serves to take part in a cosmopolitan lifestyle with connections to other, “exotic” cultures. While ethnic belonging to Latin culture does not play a role in the L.A. Style scene, this community celebrates ethnic authenticity of people of Latin background in order to construct an identity in which the knowledge of other cultures and languages is highly valued.

The owner of the dance school, a white Australian of Irish descent, emphasises her close ties to people who are from Latin American countries and is at the same time proud of her daily contact with Latin Americans, as musicians and dance teachers often have a Latin background. This enthusiasm for the “other” intersects with class identity. Her dance pupils are mostly white Australians, usually with a high level of education; many pupils are university students. Next to these white Australian students, the majority of Latin Americans within the context, interestingly, do not come from Sydney originally but are international students who have come to Australia to study and who usually plan to return to Latin America when they have finished their studies. I met only one Latin American in this context who grew up in Sydney. Being of non-Anglo ethnic descent in Australia seems to be related to the image of the lower classes recent migrant, which, for Latin Americans from Sydney with a higher education, may make it unattractive to engage in a “heritage” practice like Salsa dancing. Similarly to L.A. Style Salsa, national Australian discourses have a strong influence on the formation of the Cuban Style community.

As a consequence of an educated interest in the “other”, it is important not only to teach dance steps but also to immerse students in the whole culture that is seen as being related to Salsa. For this, the presence of Latin Americans and also of the Spanish language is crucial, although it does not denote the reproduction of Hispanic heritage culture. It is thus revealing that many dance pupils see it as a goal to acquire at least a limited proficiency in Spanish. The dance school has an agreement with a language school, where discounts are given to dance pupils. The instructions in the Salsa lessons are often in Spanish, the (Colombian) receptionist at the entrance of the school speaks Spanish with everybody who can speak it and the teachers speak Spanish with each other during the class and also with those who speak it. Although the medium of communication remains English, as many students only understand bits and pieces of Spanish, being able to speak Spanish is a prestigious activity. When I tell the owner of the school that in the beginning, I had difficulties to find Salsa dancers who speak Spanish, she replies:

It is important for her to emphasise that “here”, in “her” CofP, Spanish is an important part of the whole cultural experience. Even though she admits that her first remark might have been a bit exaggerated, she then explains that at least some Spanish is used even by those who do not speak it fluently:

This perception is obviously very different from the one that is found in the L.A. Style CofP. Language crossing, the “use of a language or variety that, in one way or another, feels anomalously ‘other’” (Rampton Reference Rampton2000b:55) has the function of creating a sense of belonging to this particular local community; simultaneously, the community thus connects to a global Salsa community. Yet, there are other important aspects in the analysis of this form of language crossing, which relate to the Australian national discourses on language. In the following passage, the dance school owner suggests that the geopolitical situation of Australia makes language learning a difficult enterprise after I had asked about the reasons for the lack of Spanish-speakers in the other CofP. She here legitimises the low interest in Spanish by many Australians:

The fact that Australia officially defines itself as being multilingual (Australian Government. Department of Citizenship and Immigration 2007; Lo Bianco Reference Lo Bianco2003) remains invisible here. Despite her everyday contact with people who have native languages other than English, the interviewee explains the low numbers of Australians who learn other languages (see also Australian Government. Australia 2020 2008:5) with the monolingual and far-off situation of Australia. On the one hand, this may be related to my own presence, where the interviewee may feel the need to defend monolingual Australians. At the same time, this leads to second language learning as having the symbolic function of belonging to a privileged class of language learners, as can be inferred from the following quote, which was uttered directly after the above quote:

In order to learn a language, the learner, according to this passage, has to go abroad, which is, in the Australian context, very expensive and not affordable for everybody. Learning a language, also a sign for being truly culturally interested, is consequently related to the intersection of lifestyle and class. Within the perception of the world as consisting of separate territories in which different cultures reside and different languages are spoken, the ability to speak a second language fluently seems to be determined by money and commitment. As Australia itself is indirectly constructed as monolingual, other languages can only be used in other countries – although this obviously contradicts the everyday experience within the CofP. Yet, the identity that is performed by white Australians when they engage not only in Salsa dancing but furthermore in the acquisition of Spanish and extended stays in Spanish-speaking countries is also an indicator of class. The culturally interested, highly educated and rather affluent language learner could be perceived of as what Hannerz has labelled “cosmopolitans”. Performing a cosmopolitan identity is defined as

Although Hannerz has been criticised for his elitist view on cosmopolitans (Römhild Reference Römhild2007), the definition of Hannerz reflects the phenomenon of the Spanish-speaking Salsa-dancers in Sydney. Hannerz maintains that lower middle classes and labour migrants are typically not cosmopolitan as cosmopolitans have a special relationship to intellectualism, where the engagement with other cultures is based on the idea of intention, rather than need (Hannerz Reference Hannerz and Hannerz1996b:105ff.). This has also implications for the cosmopolitan's relationship to the own culture of origin, as the cosmopolitan can “choose to disengage from it” (Hannerz:104) and thus performs a prestigious position in which culturally decontextualised knowledge – meta-cultural knowledge – is acquired. The ability to make “divergent cultural experiences”, in this case with Salsa and Spanish, is thus an opportunity to show economic as well as cultural capital (Bourdieu Reference Bourdieu1979).

In contrast to the study of language crossing by Rampton, where it is conceived that dominated individuals cultivate solidarities through practices of crossing (1995:294), the act of language crossing in this cosmopolitan context is not an act of solidarity among the dominated – it is rather an appropriation from above. The cosmopolitan form of crossing is not based on solidarity and is characterized by choice. This choice instrumentalises cultural and linguistic forms in order to create and perform cosmopolitan identity. “Social knowledge about ethnicity is actively processed” (Rampton Reference Rampton1995:283) but the participation in the other culture is a temporary activity in which mainstream individuals can always switch back to their “normal” self. The ability to switch, not the authentic production of ethnicity, is vital in the expression of cultural capital. “The cosmopolitan may embrace the alien culture, but he [sic] does not become committed to it. All the time he knows where the exit is.” (Hannerz Reference Hannerz and Hannerz1996b:104).

Relating this to the question posed at the beginning – do language ideologies in transnational Salsa communities question monolingual nation-state, “container” ideologies – we have to ask whether the ideologies are “liminal” (whether they have a longer lasting effect on everyday reality) or whether they are rather to be understood as “liminoid” (where the effects are confined to the space of performance itself) (terminology from Turner Reference Turner1974 in Rampton Reference Rampton1995:233–237). Ethnic categories are usually not put into question and may even be enforced through the romanticised, othering desire of the hegemonic majority. Spanish, as the “other” world language, is appropriated by those who can afford a lifestyle that includes travel, culture and time to spend in dance studios and language classes. The degree of subversion is very questionable if ethnic traits are consumed as lifestyle options and where, despite claims to authenticity, “the consumer's personal taste and purchasing power matter as much or more than their early socialization.” (Rampton Reference Rampton2000b:55).

Nevertheless, there is an aspect of liminality that can be detected in the language and dance practices of the Cuban Salsa community. Those who truly cross boundaries and transgress and transform everyday reality are, paradoxically, those who do have an early socialization with Latin American culture. However, the boundaries they transgress are not ethnic boundaries but the intersections of ethnicity and class as they have developed in the Australian context of multiculturalism. Non-Anglo ethnicity of Australians, instead of being related to a working-class immigrant background, is here linked to cosmopolitanism. Latin Americans, due to their ability to speak Spanish, their ability to perform ‘authentic’ identities, can reappropriate their linguistic and cultural knowledge and become part of a global “‘new class’, people with credentials, decontextualised cultural capital” (Hannerz Reference Hannerz and Hannerz1996b:108).