See all formats and editions
Audible Logo Audiobook
AUD 0.00
Free with your Audible trial
From the bestselling social commentator and cultural historian, a 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.
Editorial Reviews
About the Author
Barbara Ehrenreich is the author of several books, including the New York Times bestseller Nickel and Dimed. She is a frequent contributor to the New York Times, Progressive, Harper's, and Time magazine and currently lives in Florida.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
From Publishers Weekly
Ehrenreich's social history of collective joy, ranging from pagan ritual to rock concerts, comes off as an extended, rambling lecture, taking in a varied array of subjects along the way. Taking the hint, Ward reads Ehrenreich's book with a touch of the lecturer's oratorical savvy, and some of that same figure's dry deliberation. Ehrenreich argues that communal ecstasy has been too often misunderstood as an excuse for booze-fueled sexual bacchanalias, ignoring its political and social components. Ward is neither overly joyous in her reading, owing too much to the nature of her material, nor overly serious, her voice tinged with the slightest hint of charmed pleasure at the prospect of declaiming on Ehrenreich's chosen subject. The unabridged audio is not overlong as audiobooks go, but there are moments where Ward's reading drags ever so slightly, pulled down by a sameness of approach that threatens to inspire the opposite of the ecstatic moments Ehrenreich's book describes. The solid quality of Ehrenreich's prose papers over the gaps and gives Ward's reading the pleasurable (if not quite monumentally joyous) sensation it possesses.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Product details
Publisher : Granta Books; First Edition (January 1, 2007)
Language : English
Hardcover : 240 pages
Customer reviews
4.8 out of 5 stars
Top review from the United States
Tim Warneka
4.0 out of 5 stars Excellent book, Well Researched
Reviewed in the United States on November 22, 2009
I listened to the audio version of this book.
I found this book to be fascinating and stimulating. As a life-long Roman Catholic, I thought the earlier reviews that decry the author for her 'church bashing' and 'Stalin'-like approaches were rather unfair and unnecessarily ad hominem. The author clearly put a great deal of time and effort into this book (either that, or she has an amazing team of researchers working for her! ;-D). It was fascinating for me to listen as she wove disparate pieces of information into a beautiful tapestry about the history of collective ecstatic dance in the Western world. (These kinds of books are very difficult to write. If you haven't tried to write a book such as this, I would strongly invite you to do so ... you'll gain a new appreciation for authors such as Ehrenreich who make it look so easy.)
I picked this book up because I very appreciated the author's Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America and Bait and Switch: The (Futile) Pursuit of the American Dream . I appreciate the author because she is focusing on issues that, in my opinion, should deeply concern today's Christians, such as the rich becoming richer and the poor becoming poorer.
As a mental health professional, I also found her discussion on depression and mental health issues to be very insightful.
The person who read the audio book did a wonderful job. I found her voice very easy to listen to. The only critique I would offer to the publisher is that I sometimes found it difficult to tell where a particular quote ended and where the text resumed (in several cases knowing where they quote ended made a significant different in understanding the text).
For people interested in historical Christianity, collective healing rituals, mental health, dance, martial arts, and other forms of physical movement, I would highly recommend this book.
Read less
19 people found this helpful
Top reviews from other countries
katherine stimson
5.0 out of 5 stars A wonderful well researched book that tells the alternative side of western dance history.
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on December 20, 2020
Verified Purchase
I ordered this book several years ago to supplement that texts that I give students to read in a Dance History class for professional level contemporary dance students. It never fails to be a big hit in the way that it is written and in the sentiment behind the roots of our collective dance and music traditions. Engaging and surprising this well researched book is an easy and enlightening read.
Wellman
5.0 out of 5 stars Clever author
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on August 13, 2020
Verified Purchase
I like her pragmatism
Report abuse
Ms. L. Gordon
5.0 out of 5 stars A book that articulates uncertainties about Western Society from a left field approach
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on January 22, 2014
Verified Purchase
This is a book that articulated every unspoken and nebulous uncertainty I held about modern western society and supported my belief that we must fight for the right to dance in the streets...in every possible abstraction of the concept!
2 people found this helpful
Report abuse
TAMicheli
5.0 out of 5 stars A singular joy
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on June 13, 2015
Verified Purchase
Both the scope and depth of this book strongly recommends it to all who study certain kinds of festivals and events. The book is a singular joy.
Report abuse
ROMA
