Pole Dancing

Paper Summary:

This paper examines how dance?s relationship to the healing forces in ritual is at the heart of the question of how we understand the healing power of ritual. It analyses the peformative approach, as exemplified in V. Turners work, before going on to consider the in-depth case study of the Khita healing cult among the Yaka. It also argues for a dialectical approach to the roles of poles in dancing.

From the Paper:

"In such a social drama, the place of the symbols involved is that of a displacement that works by signifying - there is no emphasis on symbolisation as process. This has implications for how we understand dance. Dance then, can occupy a positional place within this world, but only as a disguised expression of the social. This is also the case with other elements of the senses and the emotions. In the Nkula cult, the rich social drama includes the placing of initiate's belongings and excreta into a calabash with a figure made of a red tree - this figure is made by men. For Turner, this indicates men asserting their domination over reproduction - the importance of the red blood tree us worked out positionally, as metaphor only has meaning in the transference from other domains of cosmology."

More papers on Pole Dancing:

• Research Paper # 95190 : "Peary and Cook: The Battle for the North Pole"
• Book Review # 126417 : "'The Dancing Bear' and Figurative Language"
• Analytical Essay # 130174 : "The Man Behind "Dancing Bear"

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