Kinesthetic<i>Choreia</i>: Empathy, Memory, and Dance in Ancient Greece

Olsen, Sarah

doi:10.1086/691550

Cited by 8 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 19 publications

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“…The old men of the Dionysiac chorus, former dancers now deficient in their kinetic abilities, are predominantly spectators confined to watching the effortless and rational choral performances of younger men. 47 Thus, infants and old men-both of whom the Laws repeatedly affiliates with Dionysus-are imperfect dancers in sharp contrast to the adults who conjoin corporeal suppleness with reason. The point emerges all the more clearly when the Athenian categorically pairs the two subgroups in his meditation on the appropriate punishment for unintended crimes committed in Magnesia.…”

Section: IIImentioning

confidence: 99%

THE POLITICS OF DANCE:EUNOMIAAND THE EXCEPTION OF DIONYSUS IN PLATO'SLAWS

2020

The Class. Q.

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How to inculcate virtue in the citizens of Magnesia by means of the dance component of choreia constitutes one of the principal concerns in the Laws (= Leg.), revealing Plato's evolving ideas about the expediency of music and paideia for the construction of his ideal city since the Republic. Indeed, a steady stream of monographs and articles on the Laws has enriched our understanding of how Plato theorizes the body as a site of intervention and choral dance as instrumental in solidifying social relations and in conditioning the ethical and political self. As one scholar has aptly put it: ‘a city and its sociopolitical character [are] effectively danced into existence.’ Drawing on this recent work, I focus on an enigmatic passage in Laws Book 7 that merits more attention than it has received, in which Plato curiously singles out Bacchic dances from those that are ‘without controversy’ (815b7–d4): τὴν τοίνυν ἀμφισβητουμένην ὄρχησιν δεῖ πρῶτον χωρὶς τῆς ἀναμφισβητήτου διατεμεῖν. τίς οὖν αὕτη, καὶ πῇ δεῖ χωρὶς τέμνειν ἑκατέραν; ὅση μὲν βακχεία τ᾽ ἐστὶν καὶ τῶν ταύταις ἑπομένων, ἃς Νύμφας τε καὶ Πᾶνας καὶ Σειληνοὺς καὶ Σατύρους ἐπονομάζοντες, ὥς φασιν, μιμοῦνται κατῳνωμένους, περὶ καθαρμούς τε καὶ τελετάς τινας ἀποτελούντων, σύμπαν τοῦτο τῆς ὀρχήσεως τὸ γένος οὔθ᾽ ὡς εἰρηνικὸν οὔθ᾽ ὡς πολεμικὸν οὔθ᾽ ὅτι ποτὲ βούλεται ῥᾴδιον ἀφορίσασθαι: διορίσασθαι μήν μοι ταύτῃ δοκεῖ σχεδὸν ὀρθότατον αὐτὸ εἶναι, χωρὶς μὲν πολεμικοῦ, χωρὶς δὲ εἰρηνικοῦ θέντας, εἰπεῖν ὡς οὐκ ἔστι πολιτικὸν τοῦτο τῆς ὀρχήσεως τὸ γένος, ἐνταῦθα δὲ κείμενον ἐάσαντας κεῖσθαι, νῦν ἐπὶ τὸ πολεμικὸν ἅμα καὶ εἰρηνικὸν ὡς ἀναμφισβητήτως ἡμέτερον ὂν ἐπανιέναι. So, first of all, we should separate questionable dancing far from dancing that is without controversy. Which is the controversial kind, and how are the two to be distinguished? All the dancing that is of a Bacchic kind and cultivated by those who indulge in intoxicated imitations of Nymphs, Pans, Sileni and Satyrs (as they name them), when performing certain rites of expiation and initiation—this entire class of dancing cannot easily be marked off either as pacific or as warlike, nor as of any one particular kind. The most correct way of defining it appears to me to be this—to place it away from both pacific and warlike dancing, and to pronounce that this type of dancing is οὐ πολιτικόν; having thus set aside and dismissed it, we will now return to the warlike and pacific types, which without controversy belong to us.

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Section: IIImentioning

confidence: 99%

THE POLITICS OF DANCE:EUNOMIAAND THE EXCEPTION OF DIONYSUS IN PLATO'SLAWS

2020

The Class. Q.

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“… Martin (2000); for ah istory and reassessment,see Chappell (2011). Forfurther literatureo n the HHymn 3, see Förstel (1979); Miller (1986); Martin (2000); Bergren( 2008) 131-60;P eponi (2009); Nagy( 2008Nagy( /09) 196 -206, (2009 12-20,( 2011), (2013b); Olson (2017).  See Nagy( 2012)e sp.…”

Section: Epiphany and Choral Festivity In The Hymn To Apollomentioning

confidence: 99%

“…On the festive poetics and aesthetics,s ee Bierl (2011) 125 -38, esp. 136 -7; on "kinesthetic empathy" and audiencer esponse, see now Olson (2017) 158 -63. mallyitshould be the turn of the performertoremember the local Muses and, in the last instance,A pollo himself. But now the Delian Muses should remember him, the rhapsodic "I"-as if he weret he god; when someone in laterg enerations should come and ask 'OM aidens, who is for yout he most pleasurable of singers that travels here?…”

Section: Epiphany and Choral Festivity In The Hymn To Apollomentioning

confidence: 99%

‘Hail and take pleasure!’ Making gods present in narration through choral song and other epiphanic strategies in the Homeric Hymns to Dionysus and Apollo

Bierl¹

2017

The Winnowing Oar - New Perspectives in Homeric Studies

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The Homeric Hymns,aheterogeneous collection of hexametrical hymns dedicated to various gods-most dated between the 7th and 5thc enturies BC,s ome rangingeventothe Hellenistic times-are situated in the sameorally-based performance tradition as the two monumental Homeric epics, the Iliad and the Odyssey. They share all the samefeatures,especiallyformulaic dictionset in dactylic metre and the Homeric Kunstsprache that,insynchrony, shifts between diachronic stages. Both the Hymns and the Homeric epics developed in an evolutionary process. Large-scale festivals and assembliesa so ccasions for seasonal re-performance, like the Panionia and later the Panathenaea in Athens, wereimportant steps toward monumental growth through rhapsodic regularization and textual fixationb etween the late 9th and the 6th centuries BC.L iteracy,writing technique, and alphabetic record all would have helped to produce ac onsiderablystable transcript,while the rhapsodes re-composed in re-performances their parts taken from the whole storyinarelay-arrangement accordingtothe principles of the Lord-Parry school. These methodsw erer efined by modern orality scholarship, narratology,a nd approaches combiningo rality with neoanalysis.¹ Since Friedrich August Wolf at the end of the 18th century,t he Hymns have been commonlyread as preludes or προοίμια,songsdirected to divinitiesbefore shifting to largere pic poems.² Direct reference to the Iliad and Odyssey in the longer Hymns-thosew ith ad eveloped story-line-is an important component in theiraesthetic appreciation. Thus we can take first steps towards intertextuality,orana wareness of adialogical relationship between narrative traditions, regardless of the medium of the Homeric Hymn and its grade(s)o fl iteracy.³ In

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The Burnt City in Performance: Place, Space, and Experience

Cole

2023

Punchdrunk on the Classics

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KinestheticChoreia: Empathy, Memory, and Dance in Ancient Greece

Cited by 8 publications

References 19 publications

THE POLITICS OF DANCE:EUNOMIAAND THE EXCEPTION OF DIONYSUS IN PLATO'SLAWS

THE POLITICS OF DANCE:EUNOMIAAND THE EXCEPTION OF DIONYSUS IN PLATO'SLAWS

‘Hail and take pleasure!’ Making gods present in narration through choral song and other epiphanic strategies in the Homeric Hymns to Dionysus and Apollo

The Burnt City in Performance: Place, Space, and Experience

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