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This essay investigates the relationship between trance and various musical and poetic expressions that accompany trance when it is interpreted as sacred. In other words, the aim of this investigation is to interpret how experiences of the entrancing power of the sacred come to expression with the sounds of music and poetry. I articulate such an interpretation through the following four sections: I) a discussion of the basic phenomenological and hermeneutic problems of interpreting what other people experience as sacred phenomena, II) an account of the hermeneutic context within which modern Western discourse interprets trance as madness that perverts the rational limits of the self, III) an interpretation of the expressions of trance that appear in the poetry of William Blake, and IV) an interpretation of expressions of trance that appear in the music of Afro-Atlantic religions (including Vodu in West Africa, Santería in Cuba, and Candomblé in Brazil).

Submitted by Jorge Silva (jorgelmsilva@ufrrj.br) on 2017-04-07T17:37:14Z No. of bitstreams: 1 2015 - Marcelo Raphael Rocha Bichara.pdf: 1577119 bytes, checksum: 6371f633930111b59a75e5fd1b91f7fe (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2017-04-07T17:37:14Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 2015 - Marcelo Raphael Rocha Bichara.pdf: 1577119 bytes, checksum: 6371f633930111b59a75e5fd1b91f7fe (MD5) Previous issue date: 2015-03-27 / CAPES / The object of our research is the mediumship phenomenon in Umbanda, focusing the syncretism as one of its central elements. As theoretical and practical reference we used the analytical psychology developed by the physician, psychiatrist and psychologist Carl Gustav Jung (1875-1961), for the depth and interdisciplinary amplitude of his studies on the religious phenomenon and its psychological approach of the religious experience. Semi-structural interviews were done with mediums in the state of trance, asking about the category Aruanda, in three terreiros of Umbanda in the state of Rio de Janeiro. Our hypothesis is that the descriptions of Aruanda, when interpreted from a symbolic point of view, can indicate the direction and finality of Umbanda?s Weltanschauung ? its psychological attitude in life. To accomplish our research we studied the birth of modern psychology, revealing the historical importance of mediumship and trance researches in the formulation of this new science. We also studied the background history of Umbanda to better understand our object. Many parallels were found between the analytical psychology and Umbanda. Both came to be in the turn of the nineteen to the twenty century, acting as compensation movements against the occidental hegemonic attitude ? analytical psychology in Europe, Umbanda in Brazil. With the data collected from both bibliographic and field research, it was possible to demonstrate how the symbolical content, that emerge in trance, helps to give form to numerous umbandas. Fluid and constantly in construction, Umbanda?s psychological attitude don?t fit in general systematizations. In spite of all the differences, it was possible to find in the descriptions given in trance common elements that point in the same direction: a revalorization of body experience, emotions and instincts, in direct opposition of Christian asceticism and modern rationalism. / O objetivo de nossa pesquisa ? estudar o fen?meno da mediunidade no contexto da Umbanda, focando o sincretismo como um de seus elementos centrais. Tomamos como referencial te?rico e pr?tico a psicologia anal?tica elaborada pelo m?dico psiquiatra e psic?logo Carl Gustav Jung (1875-1961), pela profundidade e amplitude interdisciplinar de seus estudos sobre o fen?meno religioso e por sua abordagem psicol?gica das experi?ncias religiosas. Realizamos entrevistas semi-estruturadas a respeito da categoria Aruanda com m?diuns em estado de transe, em tr?s terreiros de Umbanda no Estado do Rio de Janeiro. Nossa hip?tese ? que as descri??es de Aruanda, quando interpretadas de um ponto de vista simb?lico, podem nos indicar o sentido e a finalidade da Weltanschauung umbandista, isto ?, sua atitude psicol?gica diante da vida. Para realizar a pesquisa fizemos uma incurs?o na hist?ria do nascimento da psicologia moderna, destacando a relev?ncia das pesquisas sobre a mediunidade e os estados de transe para a formula??o dessa nova ci?ncia. Mergulhamos tamb?m nos prim?rdios da Umbanda para melhor compreender nosso objeto de estudo. Encontramos muitos paralelos entre a psicologia anal?tica e a Umbanda. Ambas surgem na virada do s?culo XIX para o XX e atuam como movimentos de compensa??o da atitude hegem?nica ocidental: a psicologia anal?tica na Europa, a Umbanda no Brasil. Com base nos dados coletados na pesquisa bibliogr?fica e no trabalho de campo foi poss?vel demonstrar como os conte?dos simb?licos, que emergem durante os estados de transe, ajudam a dar forma a infinitas umbandas. Fluida e constantemente em constru??o, a atitude psicol?gica umbandista n?o se deixa enquadrar em sistematiza??es generalistas. Apesar das diferen?as foi poss?vel encontrar, nas descri??es fornecidas em estado de transe, elementos em comum que apontam num mesmo sentido: uma revaloriza??o das experi?ncias do corpo, das emo??es e dos instintos, em oposi??o direta ao ascetismo crist?o e ao racionalismo moderno.

Much of the scholarly work on professional wrestling is based on the assumption that beyond a simple mimicking of sporting combat, the wrestling show is a spectacle that constructs and interrelates socially situated, morally significant categories. In this thesis, I focus on wrestlers themselves, and treat wrestling as a traditional practice that guides how wrestlers relate to their bodies and how they interact with their audience. This project was carried out using ethnographic methods of observation and interviewing. While participant-observation of three independent wrestling promotions provided context, twelve semi-structured interviews carried out with wrestlers at the Florida Wrestleplex in St. Petersburg yielded a model of what wrestlers experience inside the ring. The model emphasizes shifts of consciousness, performer-crowd intersubjectivity, and anomalous experiences of resistance to pain. Respondents describe an in-ring shift in consciousness, alternately referring to it as an altered state, high, or trance. After interpreting these results with reference to anthropological discussions of ritual, embodiment and practice, I argue that hardcore wrestling and the phenomenon of backyard wrestling are best understood as bodily practices that elicit altered states of consciousness for participants. By understanding what it feels like to wrestle, and what the experience of wrestling means to wrestlers, we can re-interrogate the coded messages of wrestling with regard to the practice by which they are produced. This project is intended to contribute to greater anthropological understanding of altered states of consciousness such as channeling or possession trance, as well as broader issues such as how cultural life is variably mediated by the body and by transcendent social narratives. It is my hope that by describing how they relate to their craft, this paper will humanize wrestlers, and place firmly in context some of the aspects of the genre that lead critics to suggest that wrestling contributes to social problems of violence, misogyny, homophobia, or jingoism.

Lyric Possession: A Dramatization of Italian Tarantism in Song is a one-act creative project informed by research exploring the formation and evolution of Mediterranean musical, religious, and cultural identity through the practice of the tarantella. The tarantella is a musical form woven into the very fabric of the Mediterranean cultural landscape, in song, dance and folkloric history. The transformation of scholarly perspectives into dramatic format, recalling traditional Italian folk drama, illuminates the history and cultural relevance of the tarantella through the lives and songs of its practitioners. In the Salentine peninsula where magic and religion collide, the ritualistic healing practice of the tarantella has served as a musical mechanism for dealing with reactions to socio-cultural issues such as repression of sexual identity, disenfranchisement, poverty and powerlessness experienced by Southern Italian women for centuries. Believed to have been a reaction to the venom of the indigenous Italian tarantula or wolf spider, peasant women in the Salentine peninsula exhibited poisoning-like symptoms and possession by spider spirits cured only through the performance of the tarantella and through the intercession of St. Paul, the patron saint of those who perform the tarantella, the tarantists. The purpose of this study is twofold. First, to examine the musical manifestations of the Tarantella as informed by its folkloric history, particularly in consideration of gender marginalization and female power. Second, to create a musical drama that portrays the music of the tarantella in a dramatic context that will reflect its folkloric history, scholarship by the anthropological, ethnomusicological and psychological communities in the form of the ritual itself. The project proposes that the complex, multifaceted history of the tarantella may best be captured and expressed through practice via a recreation of the ritual in the form of a musical drama.

Technologically mediated listening has changed the way in which music is heard as well as the way in which musical communities are constructed. Communities are no longer necessarily tied to place, and in the case of virtual communities, musicians can create a sense of community and a sense of place through their interactions. Some virtual communities of musicians - specifically those that specialize in electronic music - are ideally situated in cyberspace; what a producer of electronic music hears in his or her headphones when composing music is exactly what the audience hears after downloading or streaming it. The music remains in a digital format from its conception to its reception.In a Brazilian virtual community of electronic musicians called EnergyBR.net, fans, DJs, and producers exchange ideas about music, creating a feedback loop. In EnergyBR.net, this cyber-feedback loop shapes musical creation as well as a sense of place and community.

Thaipusam, is an annual festival beginning on a full moon day between January 14 and February 14. This festival is celebrated in Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, India, Sri Lanka, Mauritius and South Africa. It is celebrated by all Hindu castes, from the highest Brahmin to the lowest Dalit. An important feature of Thaipsam is the kavadi ritual. This follows the myth of Surapadma, the demon, who eventually became Lord Maruga's honest devotee, Idumban. This conversion is represented by purification ceremonies, around which the festival focuses, and in which participants enter a state of trance, in order to carry out physically demanding feats. Kavadi originates from a Tamil (South Indian) word, kavati. It describes anything that can be suspended on the body (pole, hooks and chains). Today, it is taken to mean a semi-circular structure that is decorated with flowers, peacock feathers and palm leaves. The kavadi is drawn by devotees who have hooks, attached to their skin, with which to pull along the structure. The Brahmin caste, however hook small pails of milk onto their skin instead. The kavadi usually bears a vel (flesh-piercing implement), which represents Lord Maruga's lance. Devotees who 'take kavadi' do so in a higher state of mind or trance. Chanting, music, especially drumming, and incense are used to induce trance. Focusing mainly on fieldwork undertaken around Thaipusam in Kuala Lumpur, this thesis examines the background of the ceremony, its Hindu connections and the different music associated with each caste. The different drumming patterns, of each caste in particular, are transcribed, analyzed and compared, together with the melodic music of the nadaswarum, the instrument associated with the Brahmin music.

This study investigates forms of theatre/performance practice and training that can be seen to employ ‘trance’ states or engage the concept of ‘states of consciousness’ as performative practice. Trance is considered to be the result of sustained involvement with detailed information that is structurally organised, invoking imaginative and affective engagements that are maintained as interactions between the performer, other performers, the environment and audience of the performance. This thesis investigates trance performance through the conceptual lens of dramatic arts practice. In their respective cultural contexts, trance and theatre attain qualities considered as sacredness. Trance practice and performance, across a range of cultural contexts, are analysed as social processes - as elements of power relations that influence the performer, audience and environment of the performance. As performance traditions and events, this study will examine strands of praxis that can be drawn from Constantin Stanislavski to Lee Strasberg to Mike Leigh; from Antonin Artaud to Samuel Beckett and Jerzy Grotowski; from the Balinese trance performance form of Sanghyang Dedari in the 1930s to the 1990s; from the Channeling practitioners in the U.S. in the 1930s to Seth and Lazaris in the 1970s to the 1990s; and from traditions of military training, performance violence, and rhetoric associated with the attacks of the 11th of September 2001 in the U.S. and its aftermath.

Trance and house music are sub-genres within the genre of electronic dance music. The form of breakdown, buildup and anthem is the main driving force behind trance and house music. This thesis analyzes transcriptions from 22 trance and house songs in order to establish and define new terminology for formal devices used within the breakdown, buildup and anthem sections of the music.