RITUAL AND DANCE MEMORY IN ORAL CULTURE

Text topic: Cultures of Rhythms and Spectacle

Text author: Sead Alić

It is not by chance that individual art forms appear in specific time periods. Art satisfies certain human needs but is also connived with the dominant technologies which determine their time. Marshall McLuhan approaches the phenomenon of art from the point of view of deliberating human extensions and their influence on the human experience. The artistic (in this case, dance) is deliberated on the level of understanding technologies that are and are not available to Man.

Dance is seen in the context of its importance for the understanding of preliterate civilizations. This is a context in which it is more crucial to understand the advancement of the preliterate human spirit than possible outlines of the artistic in the dances of early civilizations.

The hypnotic quality of contemporary mass media also has its sources in the hypnotic roots of seduction by dance of the dances dating from the time of preliterate civilizations. Hence the connection between the seduction dances and hypnotism of contemporary mass media and their technological roots of which McLuhan writes. Deliberation on dance once again raises the question of correctness of the path of human civilization based on the directions of technologies. Therefore the deliberation on dance requires distance and deflection for the thought which does not wish to be imprisoned.