Halbert Barton
Halbert Barton is a sociocultural anthropologist who specializes in developmental, performance-based approaches to the study of Afro-Latin and Caribbean music and dance, with an emphasis on Puerto Rican bomba. He is founder and director of Los Bomberos de Brooklyn, an Afro-Latin drum-dance ensemble that celebrates the interactive, community-building performance mode called a "bombazo". For the past six years he has organized and hosted the annual event, El Gran Bombazo de Brooklyn, in Fort Greene that regularly attracts hundreds of enthusiasts and participants throughout New York City and the Northeast. He has performed as a dancer, singer and percussionist with several of the top bomba groups in Puerto Rico and the U.S., including performances with his group at the Hostos College Bomplenazo ('00, '02,'04) and the Brooklyn Arts Council "Folk Feet" Festival ('04, '05). After receiving his Ph.D. from Cornell University in 1995, Hal was Artist-in-Residence (1997) at Teatro Milagro, a Latino/Caribeño dance/theater company in his hometown, Portland, OR. In 1998 he was awarded a Rockefeller Postdoctoral Fellowship in the Humanities for his work as a performance-based researcher and community educator/organizer. Also in 1998, he performed in the National Bomba Dance Competition in Loiza, PR, and appeared in two Ricky Martin videos. Hal is founder and executive director of the Eternal Roots Center for Cultural Research (CICRE, est. 1998), co-founder of Bombazo de Puerto Rico, and has been a primary research consultant for two recent major documentaries on bomba. In 2001 he was awarded the Hermandad "Brotherhood" Prize by the Instituto de Puerto Rico (NYC) for outstanding service to the Puerto Rican community by a non-Puerto Rican. He has published several articles and book reviews in Caribbean studies journals and anthologies. Hal's forthcoming book from Temple University Press is on the social meanings of bomba performance, entitled "Bomba! The Drum-Dance Challenge and Puerto Rican Cultural Politics".
Publications
2005. Bomba! The Drum-Dance Challenge and Puerto Rican Cultural Politics. Temple University Press.
2005. Review of New York Ricans in the Hip Hop Zone (R. Rivera). New West Indian Guide. Edited by R. S. Price. Vol. 79: No. 1 2.
2004. "A Challenge for Puerto Rican Music: How to Build a Soberao for Bomba". Centro: Journal of the Center for Puerto Rican Studies. 16: 1: 68-89.
2003. "The Challenges of Puerto Rican Bomba". Caribbean Dance: From Abakuá to Zouk. Edited by Susanna Sloat. University of Florida Press.
2002. Review of Listening to Salsa (by F. Aparicio). New West Indian Guide. Edited by R. S. Price. Vol. 76: No. 3 4.
2001. Review of Tito Puente (by S. Loza). New West Indian Guide. Edited by R. S. Price. Vol. 75: No. 1 2.
Web page: http://mysite.verizon.net/vze4gfwi//