Dancing in the Streets (28 page)
Read Dancing in the Streets Online
Authors: Barbara Ehrenreich
But the samba school danced down to the sand in perfect dignity, wrapped in their own rhythm, their faces both exhausted and shining with an almost religious kind of exaltation. One thin lattecolored young man dancing just behind the musicians set the pace. What was he in real lifeâa bank clerk, a busboy? But here, in his brilliant feathered costume, he was a prince, a mythological figure, maybe even a god. Here, for a moment, there were no divisions among people except for the playful ones created by
carnaval
itself.
carnaval
itself.
As they reached the boardwalk, bystanders started falling into the rhythm too, and, without any invitation or announcements, without embarrassment or even alcohol to dissolve the normal constraints of urban life, the samba school turned into a crowd and the crowd turned into a momentary festival. There was no “point” to itâno religious overtones, ideological message, or money to be madeâjust the chance, which we need much more of on this crowded planet, to acknowledge the miracle of our simultaneous existence with some sort of celebration.
Bait
and Switch: The (Futile) Pursuit of the American Dream
and Switch: The (Futile) Pursuit of the American Dream
Global Woman: Nannies, Maids, and Sex Workers in the New Economy
(with Arlie Russell Hochschild)
(with Arlie Russell Hochschild)
Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America
Blood Rites: Origins and History of the Passions of War
The Snarling Citizen
Kipper's Game
The Worst Years of Our Lives: Irreverent Notes from a Decade of Greed
Fear of Falling: The Inner Life of the Middle Class
The Hearts of Men: American Dreams and the Flight from Commitment
Re-making Love: The Feminization of Sex
(with Elizabeth Hess and Gloria Jacobs)
(with Elizabeth Hess and Gloria Jacobs)
For Her Own Good: Two Centuries of the Experts' Advice to Women
(with Deirdre English)
(with Deirdre English)
Witches, Midwives, and Nurses: A History of Women Healers
(with Deirdre English)
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Complaints and Disorders: The Sexual Politics of Sickness
(with Deirdre English)
(with Deirdre English)
“With characteristic frankness and an anti-authoritarian edge ⦠the history of collective joy as related here is lurid and alluring.”
â
Los Angeles Times
Los Angeles Times
“An impressive work.”
â
The Washington Post Book World
The Washington Post Book World
“An admirably lucid, level-headed history of outbreaks of collective joy from Dionysus to the Grateful Dead. In the end,
Dancing in the Streets
is not just a history of festivity, one that packs a remarkable amount into its relatively slim compass, but a timely political meditation.”
Dancing in the Streets
is not just a history of festivity, one that packs a remarkable amount into its relatively slim compass, but a timely political meditation.”
âTerry Eagleton,
The Nation
The Nation
“Combining thorough research with her tart, skeptical eye, Ehrenreich constructs a vivid narrative of early Christianity and âdeliberately nurtured techniques of ecstasy.'”
â
The Baltimore Sun
The Baltimore Sun
“Intriguing.”
â
Elle
Elle
“A terrific counterpart to
Blood Rites
. A-.”
Blood Rites
. A-.”
â
Entertainment Weekly
Entertainment Weekly
“The same brave, brilliant writing that Ehrenreich has always used to expose the dark underside of human nature, she now employs to illuminate sources of communal joy and bonding that we as a society have historically denied and continue to sweep under the rug. Tracing the long history of Europe's fight against its better impulses, she ends with the return of the repressed, as she joyously hunts ecstasy out of its hiding placesâthe rock rebellions of the 1960s, the carnivalesque that often pervades protest movementsâand urges us to let it back into our lives.”
âWendy Doniger, author of
The Woman Who Pretended to Be Who She Was
The Woman Who Pretended to Be Who She Was
“Barbara Ehrenreich shows how and why people celebrate together, and equally what causes us to fear celebration. Here is the other side of ritual, whose dark side she explored in
Blood Rites
. She ranges in time from the earliest festivals drawn on cave walls to modern football crowds; she finds that dancing has been a way to address personal ills like melancholy and shame,
social ills as extreme as those faced by American slaves.
Dancing in the Streets
is itself a celebration of languageâclear, funny, unpredictable. This is a truly original book.”
Blood Rites
. She ranges in time from the earliest festivals drawn on cave walls to modern football crowds; she finds that dancing has been a way to address personal ills like melancholy and shame,
social ills as extreme as those faced by American slaves.
Dancing in the Streets
is itself a celebration of languageâclear, funny, unpredictable. This is a truly original book.”
âRichard Sennett, author of
The Culture of the New Capitalism
The Culture of the New Capitalism
“A fabulous book on carnival and ecstasy, skillfully arranged and brilliantly explained.”
âRobert Farris Thompson, author of
Tango: The Art History of Love
Tango: The Art History of Love
“Witty and quizzical, Ehrenreich covers her vast terrain comprehensively yet incisively, casting her net wide and landing delicious detail at the same time as more strictly germane matter.”
âSimon Callow,
The Guardian
The Guardian
“A thought-provoking and sober look at a delightfully unsober topic, worth reading for the key chapters on Dionysus and Jesus alone.”
â
London Review of Books
London Review of Books
“The title of this book alone did my weary heart good ⦠. What this timely book forcefully shows is that we are social beings with a potential for collective activity that is not always destructive or docile but may be powerfully restorative. With the world political scene in crisis and the planet profoundly in need of our remedial help, it is a message to be welcomed, ponderedâand enjoyed.”
âSally Vickers,
The Times
(London)
The Times
(London)
“Barbara Ehrenreich's absorbing study of collective celebration does the essential job of reminding us that humans are happiest when doing things together ⦠. Ehrenreich has an ability to write as though she has lived through the history she relates ⦠. She draws on research from prehistory, classical civilization, theology, anthropology, neuroscience, literature and pop-cultural studies to present a convincing case for a return to spontaneous (but not too spontaneous) celebration. In doing so she alerts us to the elements of human experience that are universal and so have the possibility of equality among men ⦠. Once reconciled to the counterintuitive nature of spending hours alone reading a book that suggests you'd be better off dancing instead, time will fly and you'll end it convinced that you've been in happy, wine-fuelled conversation with the author herself.”
âLynsey Hanley,
The Daily Telegraph
(London)
The Daily Telegraph
(London)
INTRODUCTION: INVITATION TO THE DANCE
1
Quoted in Oesterley, p. 2.
2
Quoted in Moorehead, p. 30.
3
Quoted in ibid., p. 94.
4
Quoted in ibid., pp. 128-29.
5
Quoted in Durkheim,
The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life
, p. 249.
The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life
, p. 249.
6
Frey and Wood, p. 147.
7
Quoted in ibid., p. 59.
8
Quoted in Cowley, pp. 40-41.
9
Quoted in Raboteau, p. 62.
10
Quoted in Murphy, p. 149.
11
Quoted in Oesterreich, pp. 140-41.
12
Quoted in Frey and Wood, p. 25.
13
Buchan, p. 83.
14
Hambly, pp. 16-17.
15
Cheeseman, p. 124.
16
Quoted in Oesterreich, pp. 285-86.
17
Goodman, p. 36. See also Platvoet.
18
Quoted in Oesterreich, p. 286.
19
Michael Taussig,
Mimesis and Alterity: A Particular History of the Senses
(New York: London: Routledge, 1993), p. 241.
Mimesis and Alterity: A Particular History of the Senses
(New York: London: Routledge, 1993), p. 241.
20
Conrad, p. 32.
21
Oesterreich, p. 237.
22
Street, p. 62.
23
Davenport, p. 243.
24
Ibid., p. 306.
25
Kreiser, pp. 257-58.
26
Oesterreich, p. 237.
27
Weidkuhn.
28
Stoler, p. 125.
29
Quoted in Kupperman, p. 107.
30
Quoted in Stoler, p. 124.
31
Crapanzano, p. xiii.
32
Turner,
The Ritual Process
, p. 7.
The Ritual Process
, p. 7.
33
Ibid., p. 129.
34
Ibid., pp. 138-39.
35
Ibid.
36
Crapanzano, p. 234.
37
Quoted in Castillo.
38
Quoted in ibid.
39
Sass, p. 362.
40
Trish Hall, “Seeking a Focus on Joy in the Field of Psychology,”
New York Times
, April 28, 1998.
New York Times
, April 28, 1998.
41
Quoted in Stallybrass and White, p. 190.
42
Lindholm, pp. 57-58.
43
Freud,
Civilization and Its Discontents
, p. 64.
Civilization and Its Discontents
, p. 64.
44
Suryani and Jensen, p. 173.
46
Lindholm, p. 66.
47
Ibid., p. 70.
48
Lofland.
49
Turner,
Celebration
, p. 12.
Celebration
, p. 12.
50
See, for example, Beverly J. Stoeltje, “Festival,” in Bauman, pp. 264-66.
51
Ibid., p. 262.
52
Quoted in Raboteau, p. 223.
1. THE ARCHAIC ROOTS OF ECSTASY
1
Garfinkel, p. 11.
2
John Pickrell, “Unprecedented Ice Age Cave Art Discovered in U.K.,”
National Geographic News
, August 18, 2004.
National Geographic News
, August 18, 2004.
3
Dunbar, pp. 147â48.
4
Freeman, p. 129.
5
McNeill,
Keeping Together in Time
, p. 2.
Keeping Together in Time
, p. 2.
6
D'Aquili, p. 22.
7
Sandra Blakeslee, “Cells That Read Minds,”
New York Times
, January 10, 2006.
New York Times
, January 10, 2006.
8
Marcel Kinsbourne, “The Role of Imitation in Body Ownership and Mental Growth,” in Meltzoff and Prinz, pp. 312â30.
9
Lewis, pp. 35â36.
10
Heather Pringle, “Ice Age Communities May Be Earliest Known Net Hunters,”
Discover
, August 29, 1997.
Discover
, August 29, 1997.
11
Granet, p. 168.
12
André Gunnel, “Ecstatic Prophesy in the Old Testament,” in Holm, pp. 187â200.
13
Garfinkel, pp. 61-62.
14
Gunnel, p. 34.
15
Patai, p. 242.
16
See Lawler, pp. 238-39.
17
Sachs, pp. 238-39.
18
Ibid., p. 237.
19
Quoted in ibid., p. 238.
20
Quoted in Dodds,
The Greeks and the Irrational
, p. 271.
The Greeks and the Irrational
, p. 271.
21
Lawler, p. 92.
22
Evans, p. 52.
23
Nietzsche, p. 23.
24
Ibid., p. 102.
25
Obbink, pp. 65-86.
26
Dodds, Introduction to Euripides,
The Bacchae,
p. xiv.
The Bacchae,
p. xiv.
27
Evans, p. 140.
28
Calasso, p. 78.
29
Daniélou, p. 39.
30
Turner,
The Ritual Process
, p. 156.
The Ritual Process
, p. 156.
31
Ibid., p. 160.
32
Ibid.
33
Dodds, Introduction to Euripides,
The Bacchae
, p. xiv.
The Bacchae
, p. xiv.
34
Joyce, pp. 33-34.
35
Euripides,
The Bacchae,
p. 202.
The Bacchae,
p. 202.
36
Joyce, p. 43.
37
Portefaix, p. 205.
38
Vellacott, p. 25.
39
Otto, p. 136.
40
Euripides,
The Bacchae
, pp. 194-95.
The Bacchae
, pp. 194-95.
41
Evans, p. 19.
42
Jameson, p. 44.
43
Ibid., p. 47.
44
Durkheim,
The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life
, p. 250.
The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life
, p. 250.
45
Dodds,
The Greeks and the Irrational
, p. 272.
The Greeks and the Irrational
, p. 272.
46
Lawler, p. 50.
47
Burkert,
Ancient Mystery Cults
, p. 31.
Ancient Mystery Cults
, p. 31.
48
Backman, p. 5.
49
Burkert, “Bacchic
Teletai
in the Hellenistic Age.”
Teletai
in the Hellenistic Age.”
50
Jameson, p. 63.
2. CIVILIZATION AND BACKLASH
1
Euripides,
The Bacchae
, p. 205.
The Bacchae
, p. 205.
2
Joyce Marcus and Kent V Flannery, “The Co-Evolution of Ritual and Society: New C-14 Dates from Ancient Mexico,”
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
1, no. 52 (2004): 18257-18261.
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
1, no. 52 (2004): 18257-18261.
3
For more on the shaping of early societies by war, see my book
Blood Rites
, chapter 9.
Blood Rites
, chapter 9.
4
Quoted in Patai, p. 230.
5
Armstrong, p. 24.
6
Quoted in Evans, p. 149.
7
Lawler, p. 95.
8
Burkert,
Ancient Mystery Cults
, p. 97.
Ancient Mystery Cults
, p. 97.
9
Quoted in ibid., p. 90.
10
Max Weber,
The Sociology of Religion
, p. 180.
The Sociology of Religion
, p. 180.
11
Sachs, p. 248.
12
Weber,
The Sociology of Religion
, p. 180.
The Sociology of Religion
, p. 180.
13
Quoted in Balsdon, p. 274.
14
The historian Richard Gordon, quoted in Sawyer, p. 122.
15
Sachs, p. 246.
16
Balsdon, p. 275.
17
Juvenal, p. 44.
18
Cumont, p. 29.
19
Gordon Richard, “From Republic to Principate: Priesthood, Religion and Ideology,” in Beard and North, pp. 179-98.
20
Beard, p. 165.
21
Gordon, p. 122.
22
Quoted in ibid., p. 123.
23
Juvenal, p. 50.
24
Quoted in Livy, p. 409.
25
Quoted in Wilken, p. 12.
26
Oxford Classical Dictionary
, 3rd ed., edited by Simon Hornblower and Anthony Spawforth (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996), p. 229.
, 3rd ed., edited by Simon Hornblower and Anthony Spawforth (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996), p. 229.
27
Livy, pp. 401-2.
28
Ibid., pp. 406â7.
29
Ibid., p. 402.
30
Ibid., p. 409.
31
Quoted in ibid., p. 410.
32
Balsdon, p. 247.
3. JESUS AND DIONYSUS
1
George Steiner, lecture at Boston University, 1999, reported at
www.bu.edu/bridge/archive/1999/features2.html
.
www.bu.edu/bridge/archive/1999/features2.html
.
2
Timothy Freke and Peter Gandy,
The Jesus Mysteries: Was the “Original Jesus” a Pagan God?
(New York: Three Rivers Press, 1999), p. 5.
The Jesus Mysteries: Was the “Original Jesus” a Pagan God?
(New York: Three Rivers Press, 1999), p. 5.
3
See Morton Smith,
Jesus the Magician
.
Jesus the Magician
.
4
Euripides,
The Bacchae
, p. 194.
The Bacchae
, p. 194.
5
See Chance.
6
Burkert, “Bacchic
Teletai
in the Hellenistic Age,” p. 21.
Teletai
in the Hellenistic Age,” p. 21.
7
Kerényi, p. 387.
8
Momigliano, p. 197.
9
Morton Smith,
Studies in the Cult of Yahweh
, vol 1.
Studies in the Cult of Yahweh
, vol 1.
10
Ibid., p. 233.
11
Price.
12
Kerényi, p. 257.
13
Morton Smith,
Jesus the Magician
, p. 158.
Jesus the Magician
, p. 158.
14
Freke and Gandy, p. 52.
15
Cumont, p. 65.
16
“Mystery religions,”
Encyclopedia Britannica 2006
, Encyclopedia Britannica Premium Service, May 30, 2006,
http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-15867
.
Encyclopedia Britannica 2006
, Encyclopedia Britannica Premium Service, May 30, 2006,
http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-15867
.
17
Quoted in Wilken, p. 96.
18
Quoted in ibid., p. 19.
19
Ibid.
20
Armstrong, p. 87. See also Meeks, pp. 140-63.
21
Robert Jewett, “Are There Allusions to the Love Feast in Romans
13.8â10?” in Julian V. Hills et al., eds.,
Common Life in the Early Church
(Harrisburg, PA: Trinity Press International, 1998), pp. 265-78.
13.8â10?” in Julian V. Hills et al., eds.,
Common Life in the Early Church
(Harrisburg, PA: Trinity Press International, 1998), pp. 265-78.
22
Stephen G. Wilson, “Early Christian Music,” in Hills, pp. 390-401. See also Meeks, pp. 144â45.
23
Quoted in Backman, p. 21.
24
Ibid., pp. 21-22.
25
Quoted in Sawyer, p. 104.
26
Quoted in Knox, p. 28.
27
Quoted in Dodds,
The Greeks and the Irrational
, p. 274.
The Greeks and the Irrational
, p. 274.
28
Quoted in Boles, p. 68.
29
H. Wayne House, “Tongues and Mystery Religions of Corinth,”
Bibliotheca Sacra
140, no. 558 (April 1983): 134.
Bibliotheca Sacra
140, no. 558 (April 1983): 134.
30
William Samarin, telephone interview with the author, June 30, 1999.
31
See, for example, Morton T. Kelsey,
Tongue Speaking: An Experiment in Spiritual Experience
(Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1964).
Tongue Speaking: An Experiment in Spiritual Experience
(Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1964).
32
Quoted by Janet MacIntosh, personal communication with the author, May 5, 2003.
33
“Speaking in TonguesâBelievers Relish the Experience,”
Los Angeles Times
, September 19, 1987.
Los Angeles Times
, September 19, 1987.
34
Mary Smalara Collins, “I May Speak in the Tongue of Angels,” U.S.
Catholic
, March 1994, p. 25.
Catholic
, March 1994, p. 25.
35
Meeks, p. 149.
36
James Hastings, ed.,
Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics
, vol. 3 (New York: Scribner's, no date), p. 371.
Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics
, vol. 3 (New York: Scribner's, no date), p. 371.
37
Meeks, p. 121.
38
Knox, pp. 27-29; Walker, pp. 55-56.
39
Burkert,
Ancient Mystery Cults
, p. 43.
Ancient Mystery Cults
, p. 43.
40
Brown, p. 147.
41
Quoted in ibid., p. 140.
42
Walker, p. 47.
43
Quoted in Backman, p. 25.
44
Quoted in ibid., pp. 30â31.
45
Quoted in ibid., p. 32.
46
Quoted in Evans, p. 20.
47
Lewis, p. 34.
48
Ibid., p. 132.
49
Weber,
The Sociology of Religion
, p. 161.
The Sociology of Religion
, p. 161.
50
Ibid., p. 160.
51
Ibid., p. 178.
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