A few minutes ago I read a pleasant and enjoyable blog entry about some dances at a cultural festival for spring. This was in the north of England. There were photographs of dances from southern Africa, from the Alps, and from France. There were none of English dances. Perhaps the blogger didn't happen to get a good shot of them; perhaps there were none at the festival. It did make me wonder though why dances and culture from abroad is often of so much more interest to English people than our own. I know we are very porous, very open (in many cases), and that tolerance or even eagerness to absorb outside influence is itself an English characteristic.
I thought briefly of morris-dancing, something I always love to watch but people I'm with seem to find somehow embarrassing.
I feel myself dashing to add all sorts of caveats and explanations here, about not wishing to return to the past, about recognising the fluidity of culture and so on. But instead I will choose to think that readers know I'm not a Daily Mail type. My blog, my thoughts.
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