A Thought

[Dholaholic]

Hey I just had a quick question. If your team or college were to host a competition such as bruin, would you feel that same amount of pride if you were to win or place at that competion put on by your own school. I say this because i thought that if you entered your own competition and you placed, wouldnt people be like the comp was rigged? Is it better to not enter your own competition and save yourself the trouble of controversy, or just go ahead and do it anyways?
What are your thoughts?

 

[Pooja]

If you're team/school is hosting the competition you should definitely perform, but not be allowed to compete. So basically as an exhibition act, which is what I think most teams do these days.

GW used to be allowed to compete in Blowout but they stopped that after a few years...it creates major controversy about fairness, and like you said comps being rigged etc...

 

[Saleem]

I agree with Pooja completely. Dholaholic, I added a poll with this topic, I hope you don't mind! I'd really like to understand the opinions of anyone who says "compete" or "nothing at all"

 

[sulmoney]

they should not perform at all. they should help out the organizers of the show as much as possible, be it as an actual organizer, or by being team liaisons. this will help to ensure that the teams are treated with the same respect that the host team expects of others, and it will help to build bridges between teams, and help bolster the home teams reputation as well if they do a good job hosting other people.

 

[ban3rg]

they should not perform at all. they should help out the organizers of the show as much as possible, be it as an actual organizer, or by being team liaisons. this will help to ensure that the teams are treated with the same respect that the host team expects of others, and it will help to build bridges between teams, and help bolster the home teams reputation as well if they do a good job hosting other people.

I think they should definitely perform if attracting audience to come to the show is an issue. To ensure that the show has a full house or at least a respectable audience, the home team should perform and advertise this to the campus (or city/region if it's not a university's show) so that people will want to come.

Obv. this would not really apply to say, Bruin or Boston - Bhangra fans will go to those shows regardless of UCLA and BU performing (I imagine, i could be wrong).

 

[Temurzai]

Obv. this would not really apply to say, Bruin or Boston - Bhangra fans will go to those shows regardless of UCLA and BU performing (I imagine, i could be wrong).

u mean Boston Bhangra, not BU. BBC is independently run. BU, NU, TU, MIT, MP are not affiliated as hosts.


but i def believe Pooja and Sulman are both right. It depends, if you are a first time competition, you want to ensure people come, look at Burgh, their uni team performed, but they also had 3rivers and steel city perform so nvm that, haha stupid example.

lets just go with sulmans answer haha, avap/boston style, team runs the show. itll help teams out more.

 

[Meistro]

I think the home town team, or the team that's representing the competition, SHOULD perform as exhibition. There will always be members of the organizational committee helping out the teams. There are always enough helping hands. And who is to say that the performers won't help the teams when they arent performing? they get ready before the show just like everyone else. Maybe even earlier. They help all the teams and run around until its time to perform. Ive seen it happen. I just think its nice to put a 'face' to the competition. And not just MC's either.

 

[JSahota]

for groundshaker, our team wont be competing, but because our senior team is really busy with the organizing of groundshaker, we will have guest performances from our other professional teams

 

[ban3rg]

Obv. this would not really apply to say, Bruin or Boston - Bhangra fans will go to those shows regardless of UCLA and BU performing (I imagine, i could be wrong).

u mean Boston Bhangra, not BU. BBC is independently run. BU, NU, TU, MIT, MP are not affiliated as hosts.


but i def believe Pooja and Sulman are both right. It depends, if you are a first time competition, you want to ensure people come, look at Burgh, their uni team performed, but they also had 3rivers and steel city perform so nvm that, haha stupid example.

lets just go with sulmans answer haha, avap/boston style, team runs the show. itll help teams out more.

good catch - my bad. This brings up a good point - Boston Bhangra Competition has teams in the area that can perform and attract audience (MIT performs even though the event is not on MIT's campus, for example - so MIT fans will still show up). For Burgh, the uni team doesn't necessarily have to perform to attract people (cuz visiting teams are still local - steel city and 3rivers will attract audience). Similarly Socal Bhangra, which used to be run by CSUN, needn't have CSUN students dancing, cuz they can easily draw on other teams in the area to ensure crowds...USC, UCLA teams for example.

But what if there aren't other local teams that can dance? What if North Dakota wants to have a bhangra competition, or...Montana or something. They could have all the hotshot teams from around the country, but to get people to attend they would have to build a bhangra fan base on their campus first, then advertise that they will be performing, and THEN advertise the visiting teams as well. Yeah, this is an extreme/absurd/very hypothetical situation, but it doesn't have to be such a "Non-Bhangra" state as Montana or ND...take Ithaca or Syracuse as an example, so I can speak from experience.

Well, Syracuse is a bad example because even if they had a comp. where Orange Bhangra did not perform, people would still come because they have a large enough Indian base to draw upon. Ithaca, on the other hand, basically has the Cornell student body to draw upon, who are (obv) mostly non-Indian, and thus would probly be averse to attending a bhangra comp unless our own team was performing...that's because they're unfamiliar with all the good teams from around North America...because theyre rarely exposed to it....etc

So, for smaller towns with fewer Indian people, yes, the home team is the only thing to attract audience...in bigger cities (like if NYU or Columbia had a show, or LA/SD/Socal as I said above) this is not the case because of a pre-existent bhangra-leaning Indian base.

 

[Dholaholic]

Thank you guys for your opinions!

 

[Mukandpuria]

for groundshaker, our team wont be competing, but because our senior team is really busy with the organizing of groundshaker, we will have guest performances from our other professional teams

Yea i don't see how teams manage to pull of preforming at their own competition even as a exhibition. Running a competitions is a lot of work and having weekly meetings, getting work done, and practice is crazy...Not to mention that while you are getting ready to start the show you need to be getting dressed to be the first act....We have the Boston bhangra Juniors as the exhibition, becuase they don't help with organizing the compeition. After they perform they sit down and watch the show...Even then its tough for me to get them dressed, undress, and host the competition.