i n 1976 Fidel Castro declared Cuba an “ african Latin” nation. 1 one could argue that this declaration was simply a natural conclusion about Cuba’s national identity based on an acknowledgment of the majority population of african descent. However, behind policy, which works to establish the relationship between the nation-state, heritage, and “the people,” there are forces at play that unsettle their naturalized association. i investigate how Castro’s declaration about Cuba’s national identity came to be socially intelligible as true on a local and global scale by consequence of a legacy of cultural policy. the performance of afro- Cuban religious ritual in the repertory of the Conjunto Folklórico Nacional de Cuba is a window into the aesthetic composition of national identity and the larger socio-political significance of “ african” representations on the national stage in a postcolonial context. Orisha worship, as my subject of analysis, resonates across multiple disciplines: as key practice of veneration and healing of a religious faith based on yoruba cosmology, as an artistic mode of expression through a body technique, as a socio-political marker of identity, and furthermore, as a non-western philosophy of ontology. i explore Santería, 2 not to contribute to a theological debate about the credibility of its faith system or the morality of its practice, but to engage various other levels—aesthetically, viscerally, politically and philosophically—to intervene in the debates about minoritarian (namely, black) representation(s) in Cuba. this paper tracks the two engines that brought afro-Cuban religious dance performance to the stage at the onset of the 1959 Cuban revolution: dance choreography and cultural policy. these processes of choreography (preparatory technical training of dancers and design of dance) and cultural policy (mobilization of resources for performance and gathering the public as spectators) are mutually dependent (Martin). in what follows, i show how the embodied worship of Santería was transformed on stage by the revolution’s national project. i look at the state-sponsored performance beside the experience of afro-Cuban santeros. i aim to illustrate the dance’s trajectory from spiritual worship to national apparatus, through changes in cultural policy during the Cuban revolution Afro-Hispanic Review • volume 29, Number 1 • spring 2010 ~ 1 From “Ritual” to “Repertory”: Dancing to the Time of the Nation Maya J. Berry New york UNiversity