'Founded in 1983, and incorporated in 1984 as a performing arts organisation, KanKouran is dedicated to the professional presentation of traditional West African performing arts via educational and culturally enriching performances, lectures, and workshops. KanKouran's mission is to expose local, national, and international audiences to its programs in order to foster a greater respect for cultural diversity, develop an appreciation for and understanding of West African culture, and enhance cultural exchange in the arts. Although the Founder and Artistic Director, Mr. Assane Konte, is a native of Senegal, the company’s performing artists are all from the District of Columbia area and represent various racial, ethnic, and cultural backgrounds. The company takes its name from the Mandingo people of Senegal. In Mandingo culture, a KanKouran is a guide who teaches young boys and girls the meaning of manhood and womanhood as part of their transition into adulthood. True to the name, KanKouran works extensively with young people through its junior and children’s performing groups, after-school programs, children’s community dance and music classes, in-school performances, and workshops in cultural diversity. '
We thought that the reference to West African culture was very interesting and we wanted to explore it further. We thought it was fitting due to the band being relatively young and Kankouran represents the transition from childhood to adulthood, therefore the teenage years. Also this fits very well with the 'indie' genre and rebelliousness of youth. The fact it was set up in the early 80s, 1983, could be a coincidence, but also could fit to the current revival of 80s indie/punk to early 90s grunge - being fitting for the time that this concept of Kankouran came into western society.
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| EMILY CHAWAWA |
After thinking about costume and cast we decided we wanted to use a person of African origin as one of our characters and our friend, Emily Chawawa, kindly put herself forward for the role.
Also for costume we wanted to use old costume, maybe Victorian or old west-African type clothing to reference the name of the band and the meaning that, but Victorian to reference the locations that we are using as they are very poignant locations in film and literature to connote danger and passion. However, we also wanted to use new clothing to show the modern-day aspect of the band and how it is used in modern society, with still complimenting the past. Using the revival type style of the indie genre which compliments 80s and early 90s fashion, as it is usually 20 years before something is revived by a new generation, with the skinny jeans of the 'New Romantics' era in the 80s being a revival of the 'mod' style of the 60s.
This constant backlash of fashion means that style is ever-changing and shows that nothing is ever lost, so reference the locations of meaning of the name of the band would be very similar to modern fashion referencing and relating to fashion 20 years ago.
