Experiencing Zapin: Southeast Asia’s Intangible Malay Cultural Heritage

Presentation abstract

Abstract

Zapin is one of the most widely practised dance forms across the Malay world, from the shores of the Arabian Peninsula to the archipelagos of Southeast Asia. Beyond its geographic reach, Zapin carries a way of knowing, feeling, and relating that is passed through the body.

Rooted in the living traditions of Malay culture in Southeast Asia, this dance form is kept alive through the ongoing relationship between practitioner and community.

This interactive performance demonstration invites audiences to experience the live transmission of Zapin dance. With over twenty years of professional performing arts practice, the presenter shares her lived experience of sustaining movement and memory across generations through her doctoral research on Malay dance as intangible cultural heritage (ICH), the living practices, knowledge, and traditions recognised under the UNESCO 2003 Convention. Conducted at the University of Birmingham, this PhD research examines the transmission of Malay dance while amplifying the voices of ICH practitioners in Singapore.

The session presents Zapin as a particularly accessible bridge between audiences unfamiliar with Southeast Asian Malay cultural traditions and the living heritage of the Malay world, crossing that bridge quite literally through movement.

Participants will experience how knowledge in Zapin is communicated through embodied instruction through a creative sharing of foundational movements, witnessing how this embodied heritage is carried and renewed through the relationship between teacher and learner.

Through a participatory approach, the sharing opens a broader conversation about what it means to safeguard intangible cultural heritage, such as dance, through practice and participation.