The Dancing Goddesses: Folklore, Archaeology, and the Origins of European Dance

The Dancing Goddesses: Folklore, Archaeology, and the Origins of European Dance PDF Author: Elizabeth Wayland Barber
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
ISBN: 0393089215
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 590

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Book Description
A fascinating exploration of an ancient system of beliefs and its links to the evolution of dance. From Southern Greece to northern Russia, people living in agrarian communities have long believed in “dancing goddesses,” mystical female spirits who spend their nights and days dancing in the fields and forests. In The Dancing Goddesses, archaeologist, linguist, and lifelong folkdancer Elizabeth Wayland Barber follows the trail of these spirit maidens—long associated with fertility, marriage customs, and domestic pursuits—from their early appearance in traditional folktales and harvest rituals to their more recent incarnations in fairytales and present-day dance. Illustrated with photographs, maps, and line drawings, the result is a brilliantly original work that stands at the intersection of archaeology and folk traditions—at once a rich portrait of our rich agrarian ancestry and an enchanting reminder of the human need to dance.

The Dancing Goddesses: Folklore, Archaeology, and the Origins of European Dance

The Dancing Goddesses: Folklore, Archaeology, and the Origins of European Dance PDF Author: Elizabeth Wayland Barber
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
ISBN: 0393089215
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 590

Get Book

Book Description
A fascinating exploration of an ancient system of beliefs and its links to the evolution of dance. From Southern Greece to northern Russia, people living in agrarian communities have long believed in “dancing goddesses,” mystical female spirits who spend their nights and days dancing in the fields and forests. In The Dancing Goddesses, archaeologist, linguist, and lifelong folkdancer Elizabeth Wayland Barber follows the trail of these spirit maidens—long associated with fertility, marriage customs, and domestic pursuits—from their early appearance in traditional folktales and harvest rituals to their more recent incarnations in fairytales and present-day dance. Illustrated with photographs, maps, and line drawings, the result is a brilliantly original work that stands at the intersection of archaeology and folk traditions—at once a rich portrait of our rich agrarian ancestry and an enchanting reminder of the human need to dance.

The Dancing Goddesses: Folklore, Archaeology, and the Origins of European Dance

The Dancing Goddesses: Folklore, Archaeology, and the Origins of European Dance PDF Author: E. J. W. Barber
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
ISBN: 0393065367
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 444

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Book Description
An ethnographic and archaeological exploration of ancient traditions and folklore pertaining to "dancing goddesses" traces their roots in early Roman, Greek, and European cultures to reveal the origins of modern customs.

Dancing in the Streets

Dancing in the Streets PDF Author: Barbara Ehrenreich
Publisher: Metropolitan Books
ISBN: 1429904658
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 336

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Book Description
From the bestselling social commentator and cultural historian comes Barbara Ehrenreich's fascinating exploration of one of humanity's oldest traditions: the celebration of communal joy In the acclaimed Blood Rites, Barbara Ehrenreich delved into the origins of our species' attraction to war. Here, she explores the opposite impulse, one that has been so effectively suppressed that we lack even a term for it: the desire for collective joy, historically expressed in ecstatic revels of feasting, costuming, and dancing. Ehrenreich uncovers the origins of communal celebration in human biology and culture. Although sixteenth-century Europeans viewed mass festivities as foreign and "savage," Ehrenreich shows that they were indigenous to the West, from the ancient Greeks' worship of Dionysus to the medieval practice of Christianity as a "danced religion." Ultimately, church officials drove the festivities into the streets, the prelude to widespread reformation: Protestants criminalized carnival, Wahhabist Muslims battled ecstatic Sufism, European colonizers wiped out native dance rites. The elites' fear that such gatherings would undermine social hierarchies was justified: the festive tradition inspired French revolutionary crowds and uprisings from the Caribbean to the American plains. Yet outbreaks of group revelry persist, as Ehrenreich shows, pointing to the 1960s rock-and-roll rebellion and the more recent "carnivalization" of sports. Original, exhilarating, and deeply optimistic, Dancing in the Streets concludes that we are innately social beings, impelled to share our joy and therefore able to envision, even create, a more peaceable future. "Fascinating . . . An admirably lucid, level-headed history of outbreaks of joy from Dionysus to the Grateful Dead."—Terry Eagleton, The Nation

Sacred Display

Sacred Display PDF Author:
Publisher: Cambria Press
ISBN: 1621968324
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 218

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Book Description


Dancing at the Dawn of Agriculture

Dancing at the Dawn of Agriculture PDF Author: Yosef Garfinkel
Publisher: University of Texas Press
ISBN: 0292779968
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 397

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Book Description
As the nomadic hunters and gatherers of the ancient Near East turned to agriculture for their livelihood and settled into villages, religious ceremonies involving dancing became their primary means for bonding individuals into communities and households into villages. So important was dance that scenes of dancing are among the oldest and most persistent themes in Near Eastern prehistoric art, and these depictions of dance accompanied the spread of agriculture into surrounding regions of Europe and Africa. In this pathfinding book, Yosef Garfinkel analyzes depictions of dancing found on archaeological objects from the Near East, southeastern Europe, and Egypt to offer the first comprehensive look at the role of dance in these Neolithic (7000-4000 BC) societies. In the first part of the book, Garfinkel examines the structure of dance, its functional roles in the community (with comparisons to dance in modern pre-state societies), and its cognitive, or symbolic, aspects. This analysis leads him to assert that scenes of dancing depict real community rituals linked to the agricultural cycle and that dance was essential for maintaining these calendrical rituals and passing them on to succeeding generations. In the concluding section of the book, Garfinkel presents and discusses the extensive archaeological data—some 400 depictions of dance—on which his study is based.

The Cavern's Wise Woman: The Bear Goddess

The Cavern's Wise Woman: The Bear Goddess PDF Author: Annie Welch
Publisher: Lulu.com
ISBN: 1105542858
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 92

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Book Description


A History of Theory and Method in the Study of Religion and Dance

A History of Theory and Method in the Study of Religion and Dance PDF Author: Kimerer L. LaMothe
Publisher: BRILL
ISBN: 9004390006
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 122

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Book Description
LaMothe paves the way for new theories and methods in the study of religion and dance by critiquing and displacing a conceptual dichotomy between “religion” and “dance” forged in the colonial era that justified western Christian hostility towards dance traditions across six continents over six centuries.

Playing Cards of the Apaches

Playing Cards of the Apaches PDF Author: Virginia Wayland
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 330

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Book Description
Drawing on four decades of research, the authors present a history of the cards created by Apache Indians after playing cards were introduced into their culture by Spanish explorers and colonists. Includes reproductions of cards from more than 100 packs in museums and private collections around the world.

Sheela-na-gigs

Sheela-na-gigs PDF Author: Barbara Freitag
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1134282494
Category : Art
Languages : ru
Pages : 228

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Book Description
A study of the mysterious stone carvings of naked females exposing their genitals on medieval churches all over the British Isles.

Ancient Egyptian Dances

Ancient Egyptian Dances PDF Author: Irena Lexová
Publisher: Courier Corporation
ISBN: 048614870X
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 176

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Book Description
One of the few books in English on the topic investigates origins, nature, role of dance in ancient Egypt. 80 drawings and illustrations adapted from tomb paintings, other sources. New introduction. Bibliography.