Nature and Background of

Dance
 Dance

• Is an activity which can take many forms and

fill many different needs. It can be recreation,
entertainment, therapy, and religion.
• In its purest and most basic form, dance is
art, the art of body movement (Barbara
Mettler, 1980)
 Why people still dance?

• To please gods
• To lease others
• To please themselves or self expression
• To build community within an ethnic group or
social interaction (Myers, 2005)
 Primitive cultures

• Major forms of religious ritual and social expression.

• It was as a way of expressing and re-enforcing tribal unity and strength, as
an approach for courtship and mating, and as means of worship,
communication, and therapeutic experience.
• It was said that the first use of dance was a gesture in order to communicate.
• Appease the forces of nature or give them new powers of their own
• (Kraus and Gaufman (1981) said, “man danced originally to supplicate the
Gods on all important occasions of life
 Ancient Greek
• It was reflected on their wall paintings , reliefs, and
literary record in hieroglyphs.
• Dances during this era were chiefly a medium of religious
expression
• Dance as an aid to military education (boys, Athens and
Sparta)
• Entertainment and display
• Dance as education
• Dance as an integration of the body and soul. (Plato,
Aristotle, and Socrates )
• Plato immensely gave importance to dance in
education as stated in his elucidation