ALFP e-magazine issue 3: Arts and Society

Emotion and Logic: The Communication Art of Randooga
Ashiwa Yoshiko (Japan)
Professor, Graduate School of Social Sciences, Hitotsubashi University

In the social sciences, which seeks to explain the complexities of our world through theconventions of language, it is vital to have clear, concise analyses and explanations. Scholars, then,always grapple with the challenges of organizing discrete, emotional experiences into systematicconstructs with broad applicability. But does the world we inhabit really abide by that logicalconsistency, a universal rationality? In reality, our world is an emotional realm of irrationality andinconsistency. Violence and conflict—and coexistence and reconciliation, for that matter—allstem from the human mind and human society, rooted firmly in the world of emotion. Thatemotional dimension remains unexplored territory among social scientists, however—and that
relative dearth reflects the difficulties inherent in exploring the world of emotion with the toolsof language and logic.
The importance of art is gaining broader recognition throughout society. The more you probethat emotional sphere, though, the more you recognize that the linguistic and logical frameworksof the social sciences can only capture so much. I’ve researched Sri Lanka for many years,
examining anthropologically the emotional experiences of the escalation of the country’s civil war,and the issues of violence and politics that are shaping popular performing art and ritual, local
cultural, and religious representations, as well as fine arts. Navigating those dynamics has always
been a confusing journey: I’ve had to maneuver between the field, a swirling vortex of emotion,and the social sciences, a confining cage of incomplete logic. Organizing small art-related events
has helped me bridge those gaps, in certain ways. The project that left the most lasting
impressions on me was the “Randooga” initiative—a sound-based communication project that
visited several former war zones in Sri Lanka from 2012 to 2014.
The Sri Lankan Civil War ended in 2009. In the years since, Sri Lankan artists have channeledtheir memories of violence into a plethora of artwork that has garnered renown worldwide. Art
bring fames—but does it bring actual relief and reconciliation to the nameless victims anddivided communities that the war left in its wake?
My experience of the civil war goes back roughly 40 years, all the way to its beginnings in theearly 1980s. As I tracked the developments as a researcher, the country descended into murky
depths where the path forward was impossible to see—but there were occasional gleams of light,
fleeting moments of human trust that I hoped could build into a foundation for a happier, safer
society. The official end of the armed conflict in 2009 may have ushered in a nominal peace, butthe culmination cleaved deep rifts between ethnicities, communities, and even individual people.
All the people from Sri Lanka and around the world who played a role in the peaceful resolution,and I, too, still knew in the backs of our minds that the peace came about through violence.
Despite that pervading pain and loss, we kept looking for something that we could do.

© 2019 International House of Japan and Japan Foundation

ALFP e-magazine issue 3: Arts and Society

That’s when the Randooga project started to materialize. Sponsored by the Japan Foundation
with the help of the Embassy of Japan in Sri Lanka, local universities, and musicians and NGOs
from Sri Lanka and around the world, I formulated the initiative around Randooga: theinnovation of world-renowned pianist Masahiko Sato, a free-jazz pioneer. Sato’s vision, operatingon the concepts of improvisational jazz, was to create a sound-based communication method,
one where people use any tools that make sounds to exchange ideas—regardless of their musicalexperience. The project drew a diverse mix of participants, including a professional percussionistand vocalists from Japan along with the eminent sitarist, Dr. Pradeep Ratnayake, and a tabla
player from Sri Lanka, and a total audience of more than 4,500 at performances in four locations
nationwide. The participants started with workshop of a few days, laying the groundwork forstirring, joyous improvisation. The basics of a Randooga performance are simple. Every
performer uses whatever they can, be it an instrument, their voice, a pot, a bottle, or anything else,to create short phrases of sound or rhythms. Listening to the sounds and rhythms coming fromother players, the performers respond freely with their own expressions. It’s like a conversation: aperformer might respond to another player’s expression with a musical “nod,” an imitation, a
new statement, a comeback—and all without using any verbal language, of course. You play aphrase—someone might hear it and echo your call; someone might rephrase it; someone mighthear that rephrasing and transform it again; the group, through that interaction, gives shape toentirely new expressions in fluid conversation. There’s no such thing as a “good” or “bad”
Randooga performer. A cool phrase might prove popular, but no single player can evercommandeer the performance. The whole point is to create a passage of sound as a collective, anaural flow of improvisation that hinges on the group dynamic.

Workshop in Jaffna (Jan. 2012). Participants are listening to Mr. Sato’s instructions attentively.

The most impressive workshop was the first one in Jaffna, an area populated by Tamils innorthern Sri Lanka where intense fighting dragged on for years. The workshop participants werewary at first; the fact that some spoke Sinhalese while others spoke Tamil made for an obvious
communication gap. With Sato leading the way, however, they quickly focused on learning the© 2019 International House of Japan and Japan Foundation

ALFP e-magazine issue 3: Arts and Society

Randooga method. Once they gradually started conversing with each other in sound, theperformers started laughing together like old childhood friends. The whole venue resonated withan unmistakable brightness, the visceral joy of wordless communication.

Workshop in Jaffna (Jan. 2012).
Smiles appear on the participants’ faces as soon as their sonic and vocal communications begin.

Three days later, the participants gave a performance at a shelled-out hall that the community had
quickly patched back into shape. The sounds filled the space as the players built on each other’sphrases, sending a stream of unifying joy through the audience. Words can’t express what it was
like—the video is much better.

Concert in Jaffna (Jan. 2012). With cues from Mr. Sato, players take turns to improvise.

It was the first large performance organized by ordinary citizens at the refurbished hall, and theimprovisations transcended the concepts of music people have was the first experiences for them,all of which excited audience immensely. Audience members, even the school principal and nuns
© 2019 International House of Japan and Japan Foundation

ALFP e-magazine issue 3: Arts and Society

accompanying a group of middle-school students, let their bodies bounce and sway to therhythms. The people there had suffered through the terrors of a civil war. For most of them, theterrors and pains had yet to end. At the Randooga workshop and concert, though, they hadsmiles beaming across their faces. It was a miracle—a momentary one, of course, but an inspiring
testament to how communication can foster trust and confidence and wonder.
However, the issue for us lies in the next step. After the concert, the representative for UNICEF
in Sri Lanka rushed over to me and said, “You could take this global. You should establish amethod and start expanding.” Other people echoed the same idea: NGO representatives andmusic instructors from Jaffna wanted a documented method so that they could keep doing more
Randooga after we left. We’d distributed a basic guide in Sinhalese, Tamil, and English for use at
the workshop, but no one—not even Sato—had ever put the system and method into a packagethat anyone could read and turn into their own Randooga. Like any form of improvisational jazz,
Randooga is an art form where a one-time-only character plays a core role. The performance in
Jaffna was the singular product of numerous unique circumstances: the leadership of MasahikoSato, a one-of-a-kind talent; the local community’s hunger to engage in meaningful dialogue andreclaim their self-respect; the performers’ familiarity with the sitar and indigenous instruments;
the playfulness of neighbors making sounds onstage together; the efforts of facilitators with
intimate knowledge of the people; the financial backing of the Japan Foundation; the sense ofpolitical security that the Japanese embassy brought; the uniquely foreignizing effect of havingmusicians from Japan and other countries on hand; the gravity of holding the event in a hall that
represented Jaffna’s weakened—but ever-beating—musical heart.
What makes Randooga special is the nature of improvisation—the energy and emotion ofunpredictability on a common foundation. Aware of those vital elements, Sato knows how hard it
would be to frame the art form in a logical, written text. The processes of creating emotion andtheorizing emotion are completely different, making it impossible to put the explanation-defying
energy of Randooga in words—no matter how thoroughly and logically you analyze it. Going “bythe book,” if there were one, would never be enough to unleash that Randooga magic. The
disconnect between emotion and logic isn’t just a problem in the social sciences, obviously. Thatsaid, our increasingly segmented world has made Randooga’s brand of word-independentcommunication crucial for so many people. To help people keep connecting through Randooga,
we might just have to find a way to fit the art into the trappings of verbal logic. While thatprocess might be infinitely harder than analyzing emotion from a social-science standpoint, it
would certainly be a meaningful effort. Modern art, I believe, has the power to ease the pain of
the nameless multitudes, to reunite divisions directly if it uses its skill, and if it wishes. We can’t
forget that.

The contents of this article reflect solely the opinions of the author.
© 2019 International House of Japan and Japan Foundation