Between Dancing and Writing: The Practice of Religious Studies - Hardcover

LaMothe, Kimerer L.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0823224031 ISBN 13: 9780823224036

Publisher: Fordham University Press, 2004

Synopsis

This book provides philosophical grounds for an emerging area of scholarship: the study of religion and dance.
In the first part, LaMothe investigates why scholars in religious studies have tended to overlook dance, or rhythmic bodily movement, in favor of textual expressions of religious life. In close readings of Descartes, Kant, Schleiermacher, Hegel, and Kierkegaard, LaMothe traces this attitude to formative moments of the field in which philosophers relied upon the practice of writing to mediate between the study of "religion," on the one hand, and "theology," on the other.
In the second part, LaMothe revives the work of theologian, phenomenologist, and historian of religion Gerardus van der Leeuw for help in interpreting how dancing can serve as a medium of religious experience and expression. In so doing, LaMothe opens new perspectives on the role of bodily being in religious life, and on the place of theology in the study of religion.

About this title

About the Author

Kimerer LaMothe is a dancer, philosopher, and scholar of religion, with a PhD in Theology of the Modern West from Harvard University, who taught at Brown and Harvard before following a dream to a small farm in upstate New York. A pioneer in the field of religion and dance, Kimerer is the author of six books, including: Why We Dance: A Philosophy of Bodily Becoming (Columbia University Press, 2015); Nietzsche’s Dancers: Isadora Duncan, Martha Graham, and the Revaluation of Christian Values (Palgrave Macmillan, 2011); Between Dancing and Writing: The Practice of Religious Studies (Fordham University Press, 2004); and A History of Theory and Method in the Study of Religion and Dance (Brill Research Perspectives, 2018). She edited a special issue “Dancing on Earth” for the Journal of Dance, Movement, and Spiritualities (2017), and has received fellowships for her work from the Radcliffe Institute of Advanced Study, the Harvard Center for the Study of World Religions, and the Lower Adirondack Regional Arts Council (twice). She regularly lectures, teaches, and consults on the subject of religion and dance, and writes a monthly blog called “What a Body Knows” for Psychology Today.

Edition details

• Publisher: Fordham University Press
• Publication date: 2004
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0823224031
• ISBN 13: 9780823224036
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 288