Domestic and bilateral challenges to building relationality in cultural diplomacy: Tuvalu’s performative cultural diplomacy in Taiwan

ABSTRACT

In this paper, I analyse archival research and semi-structured interviews conducted between 2017 and 2018 in Tuvalu and Taiwan. I outline Tuvalu’s performative cultural diplomacy – performance/dance-based cultural policies used for diplomacy in Taiwan and other international locations – and problems that beset this diplomacy. I first discuss the importance to Tuvalu of the performative/dance form fatele, especially as it relates to domestic diplomacy and cultural representation. I then outline internal and external tensions that arise when Tuvalu adopts domestic performance protocols in its international diplomacy with places like Taiwan. These tensions emerge because, in Taiwan, fatele cannot be presented as it would be in Tuvalu and because the Tuvalu and Taiwan governments contrast sharply in their imaginings of how performative cultural diplomacy should be realised. In the conclusion, I discuss how preoccupation with domestic standards in both Tuvalu and Taiwan hinders the possibility of developing bilateral relationality through performative cultural diplomacy.

KEYWORDS:

• Tuvalu
• Taiwan
• performative cultural diplomacy
• fatele
• professionalism

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. Readers may find ‘performative cultural diplomacy’ a problematic phrase because all cultural diplomacy is somewhat performative. However, throughout this article, performative is used only to denote cultural diplomacy that includes concrete performance/dance. Furthermore, I have used performative cultural diplomacy in previous work on a related topic (Marinaccio 2017, 2019) and, consequently, have chosen to retain the phrase here.

2. GoT 2016b, 2–3; see also 6/1 Interview, GoT 2012, 1, 8, 2014, 11, 2016a, 25, 2018, 7.

3. 5/16 and 6/1 Interviews; GoT 2012, 1–2, 8, 13, 2018, 12, 20, 26.

4. See EoT 2014a, 2014b, 2014d, 2015.

5. 4/20 Interview; OP 2005, 2017a, 2017b; Wu 2012, 153.

6. Explanations vary as to how fakanau and fakaseasea differ, but many interviewees use the terms interchangeably.

7. A kaapa, or ‘tin,’ is not used in fatele for the island of Niutao.

8. 4/15, 4/20, 5/3b, 5/8, 5/11b, 5/20, and 5/30a Interviews; Beaulieu 2009. Performative/dance forms similar to Tuvaluan fatele are found in Kiribati, Tokelau, Rotuma, and Wallis and Futuna. Fatele is as central to Tokelau’s culture as it is to Tuvalu’s. However, ‘Tuvalu is … where the dance originated’ (Thomas 1996, 133–134; see GoT 2012, 5).

9. 10/19 Interview; GoT 1981, 4, 1982, 2012, 40; TE 1985, 1989; TNS 1977, 1980.

10. 4/20, 4/25b, 4/26b, 5/3a, 5/4, 5/8, 5/9b, 5/14, 5/20, and 5/21 Interviews.

11. See EoT 2013; Taupo 2014.

12. Taiwan Today 2013.

13. 4/15, 4/27, 5/11b, and 5/30a Interviews; EoT YouTube Channel 2014a, 2014b, 2015a, 2015b; Kalijia86 YouTube Channel 2013; Zhang 2016.

14. See CAB 2013, 2, 2018; 4/22, 5/9a, and 5/14 Interviews.

15. See EoT 2014c; Taupo 2014.

16. See GoT 2018; TNS 1976a, 1976b, 1976c.

17. I use a slash to indicate when the roles of TATST/TYT planners, performers, officials, and observers overlap.

18. 10/14, 10/29, 4/15, 4/17c, 4/22, 4/27, 5/12, 5/14, 5/18, 5/21, and 5/30a Interviews.

19. See 11/10b Interview; EoT 2014a.

20. See EoT 2014b; Fenui 2014.

21. Discussion of Rapa Nui is not included here because it was only relevant to the GIPP.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by Victoria University of Wellington under Grants 214491 and 221469; Victoria University of Wellington (214491, 221469).

Notes on contributors

Jess Marinaccio

Jess Marinaccio has a doctorate in Pacific Studies from Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand. She received a Master’s in Chinese literature from National Taiwan University and, later, worked as a Mandarin–English interpreter for the Tuvalu Embassy in Taiwan. Jess’s research focuses on Tuvalu–Taiwan cultural diplomacy, as well as understandings of diplomacy and indigeneity in Taiwan and its Pacific allies. She has published relevant articles in Issues & Studies, Asia Pacific Viewpoint, ANU In Brief, International Journal of Taiwan Studies, and The Contemporary Pacific.