"Those Who Gather In": An Indigenous Ritual Dance in the Context of Contemporary Mexican Transnationalism

For many generations, the Dance of the Cúrpites has been performed annually at Epiphany by young, unmarried men in the Purépecha (Tarascan) town of San Juan Nuevo Parangaricutiro, in the Mexican state of Michoacán. Ethnographic data suggest that the dance is an abstract representation of the biblical visit of the Magi, the underlying metaphor of which the dancers enact in order to express their masculinity and court their sweethearts. Examining possible reasons for the failure of the many dancers who are migrant workers to recreate the dance in California, the author contends that the context-specific meanings of the dance do not easily translate abroad. Nevertheless, upon returning home, young migrants embrace the dance as a way to reaffirm their membership in the community, thereby resolving, if only briefly, the ambiguities of their transnational lives.