Dancing in the Streets

Dancing in the Streets
Author :
Publisher : Metropolitan Books
Total Pages : 338
Release :
ISBN-10 : 9781429904650
ISBN-13 : 1429904658
Rating : 4/5 (658 Downloads)

Book Synopsis Dancing in the Streets by : Barbara Ehrenreich

Download or read book Dancing in the Streets written by Barbara Ehrenreich and published by Metropolitan Books. This book was released on 2007-12-26 with total page 338 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the bestselling social commentator and cultural historian comes Barbara Ehrenreich's fascinating exploration of one of humanity's oldest traditions: the celebration of communal joy In the acclaimed Blood Rites, Barbara Ehrenreich delved into the origins of our species' attraction to war. Here, she explores the opposite impulse, one that has been so effectively suppressed that we lack even a term for it: the desire for collective joy, historically expressed in ecstatic revels of feasting, costuming, and dancing. Ehrenreich uncovers the origins of communal celebration in human biology and culture. Although sixteenth-century Europeans viewed mass festivities as foreign and "savage," Ehrenreich shows that they were indigenous to the West, from the ancient Greeks' worship of Dionysus to the medieval practice of Christianity as a "danced religion." Ultimately, church officials drove the festivities into the streets, the prelude to widespread reformation: Protestants criminalized carnival, Wahhabist Muslims battled ecstatic Sufism, European colonizers wiped out native dance rites. The elites' fear that such gatherings would undermine social hierarchies was justified: the festive tradition inspired French revolutionary crowds and uprisings from the Caribbean to the American plains. Yet outbreaks of group revelry persist, as Ehrenreich shows, pointing to the 1960s rock-and-roll rebellion and the more recent "carnivalization" of sports. Original, exhilarating, and deeply optimistic, Dancing in the Streets concludes that we are innately social beings, impelled to share our joy and therefore able to envision, even create, a more peaceable future. "Fascinating . . . An admirably lucid, level-headed history of outbreaks of joy from Dionysus to the Grateful Dead."—Terry Eagleton, The Nation


Dancing in the Streets Related Books

Dancing in the Streets
Language: en
Pages: 338
Authors: Barbara Ehrenreich
Categories: History
Type: BOOK - Published: 2007-12-26 - Publisher: Metropolitan Books

GET EBOOK

From the bestselling social commentator and cultural historian comes Barbara Ehrenreich's fascinating exploration of one of humanity's oldest traditions: the ce
Dancing in the Streets
Language: en
Pages: 0
Authors: Judy Cooper
Categories: African American fraternal organizations
Type: BOOK - Published: 2021 - Publisher:

GET EBOOK

"Explores the history, social ties, fashion, dance, and music of second lines, participatory parades put on by New Orleans's network of social aid and pleasure
Dancing in the Street
Language: en
Pages: 336
Authors: Suzanne E. Smith
Categories: Music
Type: BOOK - Published: 2001-05-02 - Publisher: Harvard University Press

GET EBOOK

Detroit in the 1960s was a city with a pulse: people were marching in step with Martin Luther King, Jr., dancing in the street with Martha and the Vandellas, an
Dancing in the Street
Language: en
Pages: 304
Authors: Martha Reeves
Categories: Music
Type: BOOK - Published: 1995-08-01 - Publisher: Hyperion

GET EBOOK

She belted out big hits, including "Heat Wave" and "Dancing in the Street," for Motown Records during its golden years. However, behind the scenes, Martha Reeve
Dancing in the Streets of Brooklyn
Language: en
Pages: 175
Authors: April Lurie
Categories: Juvenile Fiction
Type: BOOK - Published: 2009-02-19 - Publisher: Yearling

GET EBOOK

For thirteen-year-old Judy Strand, summers in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, bustle with games of stickball played in the street, fun-filled outings to neighboring Coney