A study on the socio economic realities of Bangladesh based dancers: understanding their financial struggles and industry issues that set dance as a marginalized profession in Bangladesh

Abstract

This paper highlights the major nuances that constitute the life of a professional dancer in Bangladesh, within the local dance industry that exists. Given the socio-economic backdrop that Bangladesh has, earning from marginalised professions is difficult. There is an absence of proper structural advances and means to stabilise the profession economically. However, due to the labyrinth of other possibilities such as one’s class position, varying capitals, their ‘habitus’ and the industry’s ‘doxa’, the dancers find their realities rather paradoxical. Passion drives their interests, but the low income becomes a reoccuring theme, while the industry treats dancers of different classes, differently. Therefore, this study tries to understand the idiosyncratic economic situation of dancers who earn solely from their craft while rationalising what it means to be a Bangladeshi dancer, in a developing country, and the possible interpretations of why their realities turn out the way it does. The chosen site for this study is the capital of Dhaka, where I conducted interviews with 5 dancers. I try to fine tune the major issues there that lies in determining each dancer’s position in the economy, noting their hardships and aspirations, while critically analysing their choice of sticking to dance as a profession regardless of the struggles.