According to choreographer and dance scholar Kariamu Welsh-Asante, any examination of African dance must consider the role it plays in African society. Traditionally, African dances expressed the livelihood of the community, depicting activities such as hunting, cooking and fishing. They also played an integral part in ceremonies and celebrations such as births, initiations and weddings. Thus, for Africans, dance functioned as more than artistic expression: it formed a working definition of what made them distinctly African.
African dance marries movement, music, artifacts and function, conveying the values and beliefs of the community that created it. Oforiwaa Oduonum, head of the African Dance and Drum Ensemble at Illinois State University, states that the gestures of the hips, shoulders, legs, hands and head teach codes of conduct and transmit traditional values. Music from drums, bells and stringed instruments, clapping, and other sounds serve as the basis for the execution of movement. Dancers slow down, speed up and change their movements based on what the music does, so movement and music do not exist independently of one another.
Since African dance stemmed from rural communal traditions, community members were always an active part of the festivities. The influences of Islam, Christianity and colonialism forced conformity to religious and Western ideals, initially suppressing indigenous dance. After independence, African societies re-embraced traditional dance as a form of self-definition. Now, African dance has taken new shape, functioning as more of a spectator sport, yet with aspects of traditional audience participation such as hand clapping, call and response, and impromptu solo dances in less formal settings.