Resumen:

The author studies in this paper the different meanings that, throughout the time, different ideo­ logies have attributed to a Basque dance, the aurresku, and their relations with formal changes that have taken place in this dance. Author has based on this to expose sorne reflections about the rela­ tionship between the shape and meaning in traditional dance. As identities are not immutable subs­ tances, but narratives that we make throughout the time, tradition is very important in this process. In last years, studies from different disciplines (Sociology, Ethnomusicology...) emphasize the im­ portance of music in these identity processes. In the author's opinion, the importance of dance is, at least, similar, because in dance, like in music (but not like another arts), body involvement is very strong. This reasoning perhaps can to explain why traditional dances are so important in order to construct collective identities. Different narratives, for example, have constructed Basque identity in different ways: enlightened euronationalism, the etnonationalism of PNV and abertzale (radical) nationalism selected arbitrarily sorne characteristics and pushed away another ones, always for the shake of tradition, but always introducing changes in it. In spite of this, we do not must that identity processes or narratives are not enough to explain this process, because the most important mo­ ment is not rational, but corporal and prelogical. Anyway, we can to say that in dances, the relation between meaning and shape is basically arbitrary.

SÁNCHEZ EKIZA, K. (2000). Ideologías, identidades y tradición en la danza tradicional vasca: el caso del aurresku, Sukil: cuadernos de cultura tradicional, 3 , p. 341-352. ISSN 1135-6197.