Sacred dance: stillness and motion
Sacred dance: stillness and motion
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Issue Date
1984
Authors
Kerr, Betty C.
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Abstract
In this thesis, my intention is to integrate a written discussion of sacred dance with a performance project. In the written section, I will look at three cultures' dances and I will discuss each dance style as it expresses the qualities of sacred dance. I will use this discussion as a bridge to generalize about my own project and about what characteristics may inform dances to make them sacred.
A significant part of this thesis is my own grounding in Western dance and in the mental, physical, and emotional attitudes about the human body and its connection or lack of connection with spiritual life that is typical of Western cultures. As a result of this deep influence on my own development as a dancer-choreographer, I will devote a fair amount of the discussion to the current Western context for the creation of a sacred dance tradition. Essential to this context are the attitudes we have about the body, and about women and nature.
Both in my personal process and in this thesis I have turned to other cultures and other ways of looking at "art" as a way to reclaim the sacred quality in dance. I discuss in this thesis the influences of these cultural forms on my own work. I do not, however, intend to give any in-depth view of either South Indian dance or Native American dance. Primarily I am concerned with the ways in which these dance traditions teach an alternative way to experience dance, because they are deeply rooted in cultures that see art as a manifestation of the sacred. I believe that the direct experience of a sacred practice can be the most powerful of teachers, and that once experienced it can be integrated into a form that is relevant to modern Western people.
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Keywords
Dance, sacred