This work is the second part of the article “From Continuity to Rhythm” (Acta Se-miotica, II, 3, 2022), where I set out to define rhythm as a semiotic concept. The cornerstones for such a definition are Victoria Santa Cruz’s concept of Rhythm as an active and continu-ous principle of integration, Landowski’s understanding of continuity, Leibniz’s notion of Harmony, the physical concept of entrainment, and the formal definition of feedback from engineering as a framework to understand manipulation, adjustment and entrainment. The main contributions are: 1) analysing the regimes of adjustment and manipulation in terms of feedback, 2) establishing a link between manipulation and adjustment, showing that the former is a simplification of the latter, 3) providing a semiotic definition of entrainment that considers five different dimensions, expressing manipulation and adjustment as ...

This work departs from the opposition between continuity and discontinuity as formulated by semiotician Eric Landowski. I argue that the opposition is a complex that can be fruitfully analysed in terms of self-identity vs difference, unity vs diversity and determinism vspure randomness. The study of these oppositions deploying Greimas’s square provides an insight into the notions of difference, boundary and cohesion. These will be key to the formulation of a semiotic concept of Harmony as the interplay between a unifying and a diversifying force. Harmony, I claim, is the first step for the study of rhythm as a semiotic concept.

In this work we contend that studying dance syntax systematically is essential to gain a deeper understanding of dance practices. The reason is that syntax has to do with an essential aspect of dance, music and action in general, namely possibility. To the best of our knowledge, the efforts towards a systematic method to study dance syntax are scarce. Therefore, this work proposes the method of Finite-State Automata, borrowed from computer science, and presents three case studies of progressive complexity were the method is applied: (1) learning the basics of salsa, (2) diachronically comparing hip-pushing action in Afro-Ecuadorian Bomba del Chota, and (3) characterizing improvisation in Afro-Peruvian zapateo. While the first case is didactic and introduces the method progressively, the second and third cases are based on several years of fieldwork conducted by the authors with the Afro-...

De la música afroecuatoriana se decía que sus instrumentos eran de lo más “primitivos” y que su letra era como “palabras sacadas de la conversación de un niño… sin belleza”. En el Perú una mirada igualmente racista se extendió hasta la república dándose por “felizmente integrado” (y por tanto, invisibilizado) el legado africano en el criollismo. De esta manera se condenó la memoria de los pueblos afrodescendientes al desvanecimiento. Pese a que estas aseveraciones tienen su raíz siglos atrás, aún hoy existen vestigios de estas formas históricas de percibir los bailes y las músicas afroperuanas y afroecuatorianas. Por esta razón, el afán de este libro es contribuir a la revalorización de la memoria de los pueblos afrodescendientes del Perú y el Ecuador; una memoria que se resiste a desvanecerse, una memoria que lucha activa y que es una fuerza creadora. En...