Dr. J. Lorenzo Perillo presents Dancing in the Diaspora at the 2026 Philippine Studies Conference, UK

Dancing in the Diaspora (2025) is a multimedia performance film and practice-based research project that explores Filipino migration, cultural memory, and identity through dance, storytelling, and visual media. Created collaboratively with university students, community artists, and high school participants in Hawaiʻi, the project brings together contemporary Indigenous Filipino and ʻori tahiti choreography, hip-hop dance, contemporary dance, kulintang, kundiman, and Ilokano and Native Hawaiian chant.

Situated within Hawaiʻi—home to one of the largest Filipino communities outside the Philippines—the project highlights how dance and performance function as archipelagic forms of meaning-making. Through choreography, music, and narrative, Dancing in the Diaspora reflects on histories of labor migration, cultural adaptation, and belonging while exploring how Filipino identities are continually shaped through movement across islands and oceans.

J. Lorenzo Perillo is Associate Professor of Theatre and Dance at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa and Co-Director of the Center for Philippine Studies. His research examines Filipino dance, diaspora, and cultural politics. He is the author of Choreographing in Color: Filipinos, Hip-hop, and the Cultural Politics of Euphemism (Oxford University Press, 2020). Perillo’s work integrates scholarship, choreography, and community collaboration to explore Filipino cultural production across global diasporas. His recent projects include Dancing in the Diaspora, a performance production examining Filipino migration histories in Hawaiʻi through dance, storytelling, and multimedia performance.

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