Cultural Memory in Motion: Pride and Shame in Ballet, Jazz, and Hip-Hop

Abstract: This study examines the pride–shame complex at work in national cultural memory through the lens of three dance traditions: ballet, jazz, and hip-hop. Ballet embodies nationalistic pride rooted in exclusionary aristocratic histories, whereas jazz and hip-hop provide marginalized communities with ways to negotiate shame and transform it into cultural power and resistance. Drawing on Bourdieu’s concept of cultural capital and Halbwachs’s theory of collective memory, the paper argues that the coexistence of pride and shame strengthens national identity. As an embodied cultural practice, dance gives shape to the tensions between celebration and exclusion, offering a means for ethical engagement with historical injustices and the promotion of an inclusive cultural memory. This study contributes to interdisciplinary discourses concerning social memory, identity, and cultural politics. Keywords: pride-shame complex, national cultural memory, ballet, jazz, hip-hop, cultural capital, collective memory, embodied culture, social identity, cultural politics, historical injustice