The ‘systems of relay’ in doing cultural studies: experimenting with the ‘Body without Organs’ in b-girling practice

Abstract

In this article, I highlight the system of relays between Deleuze and Guattari’s (2010) ‘Body without Organs’ (BwO), the gender politics of Sydney's breakdancing scene that regulate ‘what a body can do’, and my own breakdancing (b-girling) practice. The BwO is not a static notion, but both ‘a practice [and] a set of practices’ through which the body de-stratifies from the prevailing order of domination - such as gender - and refills with intensities that cannot be reduced to the generality of representation. This critical approach invites researchers to ‘experiment’ with the body’s affective capacities, and exposes breakdancing as a salient site to increase the regulated repertoire of bodily expression. My ‘practical action’ as a b-girl, then, deploys a new methodology to both negotiate the gendered assumptions of the scene and locate possible lines of social transformation.

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank Dr John Scannell for introducing me to the theory of Deleuze and Guattari and, in doing so, changing the way I think about absolutely everything. His advice on, and contributions to, our joint article in 2013 has been instrumental in my analysis of both my breaking practice and my involvement in the Sydney community. As such, I could not have written this article without that early guidance. I would also like to thank Rebecca Hawkings for her suggestions on structuring this article, as well as her edits on earlier drafts. Finally, I would like to thank the Sydney breaking community. This includes my crew 143 Liverpool Street Familia – thank you for sharing your knowledge and for your continual support – as well as my fellow Sydney b-girls – thank you for sharing your experiences with me.

Notes

1. Practitioners disapprove of the title ‘breakdancing’, as it emerged during the media’s exploitation of the dance in the early 1980s. The titles b-boy/b-girl were created by the famous deejay Kool Herc for the dancers that frequented his early parties in the Bronx (see further Chang 2007 and Schloss 2009). What the ‘b’ stands for is contested – most think ‘break’, but there’s also ‘beat’, ‘battle’ or ‘Bronx’ (see Schloss 2009 for a more detailed discussion).

2. This notion originates with Spinoza who, according to Deleuze (1988), declared: ‘[w]e do not know what a body can do […]’ (17). See Buchanan (1997) for a more in-depth analysis of this theory.

3. I am one of only a few active b-girls in Sydney. There are a little over a dozen b-girls throughout Australia.

4. The other hip-hop elements are graffiti (writing), emceeing (rapping) and deejaying.

5. Including, but not limited to, swing and jazz styles (including the Charleston, lindy hop, jitterbug), tap, salsa, the Latin ‘Hustle’, martial arts such as kung fu and capoeira, gymnastics and popular culture (see Banes 1994; Chang 2007; Israel 2002; Schloss 2009).

6. The notion of integrating theory and practice is by no means a new phenomenon, and is central to ‘auto-ethnography’, ‘practice-led-research’ and ‘practice-as-research’ methodologies, which are used and debated across the fields of anthropology and performance studies.

7. Though Mitchell goes on to note that women in Sydney’s hip-hop culture represent ‘a small, growing, refreshingly different, and, it is hoped, destabilising, minority’ (2003, 44).

8. Sydney b-girl Catwmn explained how she was turned down from a paid performance after the promoters decided they only wanted b-boys (interview with author, 24 October 2014).

9. There are multiple axes of differentiation that mark bodies including gender, sexuality, race, class and ability. The imposed brevity of this article has led me to focus on merely one of these – gender – while I acknowledge that the others demand attention in a different forum.

10. Deleuze and Guattari’s BwO has become a popular tool used in performance studies to critically think about transgressive practices in a range of dance and performance practices (see Cull 2009; Jordan 1995; LaMothe 2012; Lawrence 2011; Markula 2006a, 2006b).

11. Building on Marcel Mauss’s (1973) work on the ‘techniques of the body’, Pierre Bourdieu developed the concept of habitus to account for the ‘structuring structures’ of socialization (1990, 53), such as styles, tastes, skills, and habits, and the embodiment of these structures facilitate engagement in specific social milieus.

12. See Young (1980) regarding ‘embodied femininity’.

13. These are names of breakers in the Sydney community who were interviewed in my research.

14. Often posters for competitions will detail that it is a ‘3v3 b-boy’ (or ‘3on3 b-boy’), and here both male and female breakers can enter with, in this instance, up to three breakers per team. In contrast, the terms 'b-girls' or 'b-girling' is always women only – a segregation reinforced through b-girl(-only) battles. Male breakers would never be called ‘b-girls’ and I argue this separate vernacular illustrates the subordinate status of b-girls.

15. Also, in preparation for battles emcees will often shout into the microphone, ‘B-boys are you ready?’; though it is likely that b-girls are included.

16. In this battle, the rest of my team and all of the opposing team were male.

17. While it is common in breaking competitions to reassure or ‘psych up’ the crewmate battling next, this often takes the form of ‘Don’t worry – you’ve got this’ and ‘You can easily take them’.

18. This is not dissimilar to my paper with Scannell (2013), where we noted the potential of the ‘singularity’ (Deleuze and Guattari 2010) as a framework for comprehending ‘style’.

19. Though there is a long history of b-girl participation (Kramer 2008), more recent and notable b-girl successes include sisters Ayumi and Narumi from Japan, who in 2011 battled in the international competition 'Raw Circles' – an invitation-only two-on-two battle. In 2014, AT from Finland won the ‘Focus Footwork’ battle at IBE (International Breakdance Event) – a one-on-one event that attracts in excess of one hundred participants. And the latest, Queen Mary from Bulgaria, who is not only one of the more accomplished female power movers in the world, but in 2015 was also the first b-girl to win a Red Bull BC One Qualifier (a one-on-one competition), which deemed her ‘Cypher Champion’.

20. In this video, Terra, a six-year-old b-girl from the UK, demonstrates her advanced skills in power moves in a battle against an older b-boy. B-girl Terra’s accomplishments ‘cut across’ to mainstream culture, as she was featured in a range of news articles, advertisements and also interviewed on 'Ellen'.