Raas Ruckus Dance Team at UCSD

The competitive Garba and Raas team at UCSD is a non-profit, recreational club with a cultural twist. This group promotes Garba and Raas, two interrelated West-Indian dance forms that originated from the state of Gujarat. In this day and age, Garba & Raas have been transformed from the deeply traditional precursors to the more energetic, contemporary form that is practiced by this team. In addition to simply developing and performing modern Garba/Raas choreography on campus, this team intends to partake in national, collegiate Garba/Raas competitions, thereby representing the University of California, San Diego and promoting school pride. At the local level, this seems also seeks to promote cultural and social awareness of this dance form and the related cultural connotation by performing on campus, and at nearby universities, as well as by eliciting participation from the student body. An implicit goal of this organization is to build a community at UC San Diego for all students who dance for the team and wish to be involved.