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The southern San and the trance dance: a pivotal debate in the interpretation of San rock paintings

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2015

J. David Lewis-Williams  and
David G. Pearce
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Extract

Cave paintings and first-hand ethnographic accounts from living peoples have led to the notion that southern African spiritual experts routinely mediated with the other world through energetic dances leading to the trance state. The evidence for this idea has been challenged in recent years, and the importance of the trance dance diminished accordingly. The authors confront these criticisms and place the shamanistic dance back on centre stage—with important consequences not only for the study of San peoples, but for wider prehistoric interpretations.

Keywords

southern Africaethnographyrock artSanshamanismtrancedance
Type
Research article
Information
Antiquity , Volume 86 , Issue 333 , September 2012 , pp. 696 - 706
Copyright
Copyright © Antiquity Publications Ltd. 2012 

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