Mullis, revised summary

Mullis (2008)- I’m thinking that this reading reflection could go well in the section on teaching embodiment rather than in the lit review??

In “The Image of the Performing Body” Mullis considers how the body is transformed into an aesthetically expressive medium. Though his work specifically considers dancers and actors, he provides useful explanations of experiences of embodiment that can be applied to the practice of yoga. Mullis explains the process through which the body acquires physical skill using the notions of “body schema” and “body image.” Mullis cites the work of Shaun Gallagher who defines body image as “a complex set of intentional states and dispositions—perceptions, beliefs, and attitudes—in which the intentional object is one’s own body” (2008:62). Mullis breaks body image into three components: body percept, body concept, and body affect. “Perception gives me a sense of the condition of my body at any point in time, while conceptions build upon perceptual content and allow one to understand the nature of one’s embodiment” (63).  Mullis also highlights how body image, particularly body percept and concept are highly influenced by cultural and societal standards of beauty, fitness, health. The ways in which our bodies are “invested with emotion” is also culturally influenced, claims Mullis (63).

 

Body schema as first defined by Head and Holmes in 1911, is the subconscious postural model of the body. “Body scheme functions by continually comparing the body’s present posture to those held in the immediate past. That is, at the preconscious level, schema provides a standard against which changes in posture can be judged” (63).  Mullis gives the example of moving to answer the phone. The body automatically knows how to get up and move to the phone, if you had to think about how to make every little movement you’d never get to the phone on time. Body schema provides the following three functions. First, input is the way that information about posture and movement are processed through balance, joints, skin, and muscular and kinetic sources. Second, output is the motor programs both innate (reflexes) and learned (such as riding a bike) that are elicited by the environment—just like riding a bike; they come back to you when you need them. Third is the translation of visual information to proprioceptive information. For example, if a teacher demonstrates a movement, and says do it like this, the body can imitate. This function of body schema is essential for communication.

Mullis explains that though body schema is normally preconscious, it can enter consciousness. This happens when the body is learning a new motor skill. Mullis quotes Gallagher to illustrate, “the dancer or athlete who practices long and hard to make deliberate movements proficient so that movement is finally accomplished by the body without conscious reflection uses a consciousness of bodily movement to train the body-schematic performance. Proprioceptive information (especially visual and kinesthetic) is used to develop schemata that, in time, will be automatically elicited by the environment.” (CITE!!)

Body schema feeds into body image, providing information for its formation (64).

In yoga, as in dance or performance, students are taught to be more skillful in their movements by becoming conscious of subconscious postural schemas and training the body to do something different. A change in body schema can affect the body image, one’s conscious experience of the body. Mullis (67) cites several studies that demonstrate that individuals who engage a high degree of physical activity tend to be more positive about their bodies. In both performance art and yoga, the body is transformed into an expressive instrument and a higher quality of perceptual and affective experience of the body may be developed.

 

Effortless performance (69): Talking about how performers communicate physically- communicative gesture is contingent upon interaction between performers and audience. The movement itself is meaningless, but because a communicate space (72) is developed meaning is assigned. Same in a yoga class- a teacher creates a communicative space where movements and expressions are assigned meaning. (“like your inner body be bright like the sun in shining in your heart”). Yoga teachers ask students to convey a certain attitude through their movement, which the instructor assigns- having fingers open wide conveys an attitude of radiance.

Mullis concludes that performance arts (and I think yoga too) “entail transforming the body by consciously developing the functions of the body schema…. Ultimately, this transformation entails using intention to consciously develop functions that normally take place below the level of consciousness” (74). > this makes body become an aesthetically valuable (for performance arts). For yoga, I might argue that this is how the practice becomes a vehicle of personal and spiritual transformation.

“Body schema acts as the intermediary between conscious intent and realization of specific goals” (74)

 

Donna Farhi on embodiment

Donna Farhi

“Everything that has ever happened to us—our birth, the fall from a tree at the age of six, our thoughts, feelings, what we eat, the climate we live in—is inscribed upon our body, creating a living archaeological record. When we develop an awareness of the interior movement that permeates the body, we gain access to the movement of our minds. Yoga is a means of revealing our connection to this natural wisdom.” (83).

 

84- objectification of the body. State of dissociation. “Physical fitness” – focuses on superficial appearance of body- armouring of the body “causes a numbing of the subtler sensations and feeling and, not coincidentally, dampens any possibly awareness we might cultivate of deeper body systems.” (85)

 

85-6 “Instead of directing the body as a separate entity, we relocate our minds within our body and begin to listen to the nonverbal, nonmental information contained within the soma. As we give our full attention to every breath, movement, and the subtlest of sensations, the body becomes mindful, the mind becomes embodied. In so doing, we directly experience the body as an opaque form of consciousness, and we start to see the intimate relationship between the contents of what we think, feel, and imagine and our physical reality. In this reconciliation between body and mind we begin to experience a unitive rather than divisive state. This is what distinguishes the authentic practice of hatha Yoga from mere stretching.”

 

-       imitations of the outer world  in asanas- creativity, discovery of origins of movement and original meaning of gesture (87).

 

88-
“when we first enter a posture we are met by our ability of inability to take on this new form. We feel all the palces where we hold tension. These areas of accumulated tension represent the repetition of our ideation process, that is, our thoughts, fears, tensions, and anxieties coalescing into distinct patterns of tension and form our unique individual posture or attitude of life.

Jenkins and Valiente in Csordas 1994

Emotion isn’t universal, its “culturally constituted and situationally specific  to social realms” (163). Emotional dichotomies: female/natural/devalued/dangerous vs male/cultural/controlled.

Quotes Geertz (1973:81)- “not only ideas, but emotions too, are cultural artifacts”- culturalist approach to emotion. They argue the problem with the culturalist approach is that it takes emotion out of the body and perpetuates the false dichotomy of mind: culture as body: biology. It renders the emotional experience in the body insignificant to cultural-symbolic analysis. We need to consider how culture is in the body and also how the body shapes culture. The body isn’t a tabula rasa for culture- “we are impressed with the degree of intentionality and agency of the body in creating experience” (164).

Nervios- “refers at once to mind, body, and spirit and does not make cultural sense in reference to mind-body dualism” (166). Caused by pent up emotion (167-8).

Interviewees use of simile and metaphor to try to convey incommunicable bodily experience- only partially able to objectify it. Linguistically unclear- described in metaphorical way and they use different feminine and masculine articles (170).

Forceful experience of calor (heat) described with dysphoric and emotional language> fear, dread, worry, despair, anger… (170).

Important summary of calor 174- “bodily channeling of emotions”- “embodied metaphor” of trauma that constitutes the habitual body memory.

Calor (and pain) not clinically observable or measurable (175).

The study raises important questions- are all bodily experiences infused with feeling and emotion? more so for negative ones?

Main points:

- body has agency- plays a pary in creating culture, body not just tabula rasa

- start from vantage point of looking at experience- not just cultural discourse on emotion- look at individual cases

- body as BOTH cultural object and subject

- inseparability of being-in-the-world and representations of experience

-need to contextualize- look at sociopolitical, and especially gendered experiences.

Low in Csordas 1994- Embodied Metaphors, Nerves as lived experience

- Analysis produces dualisms- body/mind, biological/cultural. Dilemmas of how to avoid/reduce dualism. Her approach is to focus on lived experience and less on vocabulary of signs and symptoms (139)

-Relates to the importance of language- language of symptoms makes the sufferer an object. Re-conceptualize the physical/emotional embodiment of nerves- “reconceptualization places the sensations back in the body of the sufferer and in most cases demedicalizes them” (140)

- Use of metaphor to describe symptoms- do metaphors provide values to bodily experience? “Are these metaphors essential to our understanding of cultural variation in illness embodiment?” (140). Metaphorical language is cultural but embodiment may have cross-cultural commonalities (141). For example, nerves as a cultural appropriate form of resistance.

DEF- Metaphor is “primary way for individuals and cultures to make sense of the word” (143). Embodied metaphor= “metaphor conveys lived experience in culturally meaningful way. physical/emotional experience of nerves as embodiment of distress (142).

Metaphor is strategic- it “allows for the communication of otherwise senseless and unspeakable suffering”. Its a plan for action and a performance (143).

Thought comes from metaphor, metaphor is grounded in the body and emerges from it, producing categories of thought and experience” (143). > In yoga do our common bodily experiences of the physical make similar metaphors come up for us?

“Thus body metaphors provide a possible solution for the expression of lived experience that can communicate bodily sensation as well as social, cultural and political meaning” (PAGE?)

Notes from Csordas 2002- Body/Meaning/Healing

- He argues religion/belief provides people with meaning through healing (1).

- Book is about the “meaning of our existence as bodily beings, the way that meaning is sometimes created in the experience of the sacred, and the meaning of the transformations that can take place in such experiences of the sacred” (1). hmmm, how does this relate to yoga. certainly does…

- Defines experience in anthropology- anth is not to capture experience by “give access to experience as the meaningfulness of meaning” (2).

- Language is a representation, but doesn’t capture the existential richness of “being-in-the-world” (3)

-Healing is not the elimination of disease but the transformation of a person, a self that is a bodily being” (4).

Components of the therapeutic process: predisposition, empowerment, transformation (5) – focus of ch 1

ch 2- focus is on formulating notions of embodiment.

Causal reasoning- why illness came about?- compare this to yoga practitionners- we look for reasons in our lives that we’re feeling pain- is pain in our hips/shoulder/etc a manifestation of emotional blockage or relationship issue, etc?

“somatic modes of attention”- culturally elaborated ways of attending to and with one’s body in surroundings that include the embodied pain(?) page 7

carrying the practice

1000s of miles away from home the practice travels with me. I meditated on the plane, did a few poses to release all the sitting before bed, and then meditated again. This morning I got up and directly moved into meditation and yoga practice- practicing feels totally instinctual and routine, despite all of my surroundings being different. The room I’m staying faces east, it was wonderful to actually salute the sun, and feel filled by its warmth and light.

I felt quite anxious and emotional while traveling yesterday. Today after such a good practice I gained greater capacity to be with the reality of what is and look for the peace and joy. I’ve been focusing on Thich Nhat Han’s passage on touching pain and touching joy- I’ll look for a link to post to it… his outlook is so compassionate and gentle, its really wonderful. I also have been contemplating Cope’s section from “Yoga and the Quest for the True Self” about living in the real. He talks about finding the balance between awareness/clear seeing and equanimity/calm abiding. Right now in the midst of some difficult adjustments and limbo I think I really need to cultivate a strong sense of calm abiding. A few quotes that struck me from Cope:

“In addition to acknowledging and experiencing life, we must learn to “bear” life, with both its attendant vicissitudes and pleasures. By “bearing” Semrad means creating the capacity in the self to tolerate the experience of life. He means creating a container to hold life in such a way that we are not shattered by it. He means developing the calmly abiding center as a continuous home base from which it is possible to range freely through our entire experience…. without the foundations of the calmly abiding self in place, the experience of awareness can simply be shattering, fragmenting, and traumatic…” (126).

Its all based on practicing balance and finding equilibrium (which is not static)- moving back and forth between greater awareness and calm abiding. “As more abiding center is cultivated, it calls for and creates the container for more awareness. As awareness is honed, and more of the unconsicous is revealed, it calls for stronger abiding center to hold it” (138).

At this point in my practice calm abiding meets me on the mat, and from there I just have to be ready to meet it, go into it at my center and cultivate it. Today I was able to really experience it in the practice- its a sense of center, its a sense of being grounded, being held in the practice physically and mentally, and being able to trust that i can rest into that warm embrace.

Oats in Csordas 1994-”Leib” and Qigong

Oats begins his piece with an argument against common position in medical anthropology of the body as an object and culture as the subject that acts on it. He proposes that the body is “culture-generative” also. He goes on to discuss the etymology of “body” and “embodiment”- he finds neither term is satisfactory. He proposes the German terms for the body: “korper” and “leib”. Korper encompasses the structural aspect of body, it is the objectified body, the corpse, a vessel. “Leib” is the living body, my body with feelings, sensations, perceptions, and emotions. Life derives from the same root as leib. It is the life, the person, the self. Leib is preferable  to embodiment because embodiment perpetuates the subject-object dictotomy- we become embodied, something takes pocession of the body (such as society or culture). A better non-directional term proposed by Devisch is “bodiliness.” Oats finds this term too “static,” it omits the life and emotions of the body. Leder proposed “lived-body”, which Oats finds quite close to leib, but he thinks the compounded term is too cumbersome.

Leib opens up a new dimension from which we can consider the body, this is “body as individual” (117). Emotions are “leibly” felt- such as the chest tightening in grief, or the knotted stomach of anxiety described in western society.

Mind: it is life/body that is capable of making mind active. “Mind is expression of culture structure and social relations impose innumerable constraints and limits on leib- think of Mary Douglas’ work (1982 (1970).

According to the view of the body in of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM), “emotions literally express themselves through bodily changes” (118). This, Oats contrasts to the Western view explained by Michelle Rosaldo that emotions are embodied thoughts. They are felt through the body (a tightening in the stomach in response to anxiety for example). It is the thoughts expressing themselves through emotions through the body, rather than the emotions directly expressing themselves. The Chinese concept of “qi” relates to are and bodily forces in an energetic/emotional sense. Qi is similar to the Indian concept of “prana” or the Greek “pneuma”. Prana and qi is the air we inhale becoming a a life-giving force, a sort of “cosmic breath” (120). In the Chinese practice of qigong, it is typically explained that qi is moved using the mind’s power to guide it- qigong can only be practiced visa the control over one’s mind over body, especially control over emotions. Yet, in Oat’s fieldwork he found large groups of practitioners who were turning away from these controlled forms of practice and practicing a much more spontaneous form of qigong where trance-like states where the body was completely out of control are reached.

Oats (125) began practicing with a group of qigong practitioners- he entered as a practitioner not an anthropologist. At first he found his interview very disappointing. Despite acting in culturally stigmatized ways (losing control of the body in the practice), in interviews pracitioners would always give culturally appropriate answers. As he stuck with the group, and conducted more than 8 interviews with many people, over time they began to open up. They revealed an intense emotional world and great emotional releases (127- really interersting description of emotional release, 129 poem). He found that the pracitioners used qigong as a mode of expression under political repression of the 1980s (130). He applies a Turnerian anaylsis of the states of pracitioners- communitas, liminality, etc.

One quote from an interview is particularly demonstrative of how the practitioners saw their bodies in a way unconventional and opposed to the TCM view of mind over body/emotions. “Movements no longer follow the thought, the thoughts instead the thought and images(?) develop out of the movement and are guided by them” (132). I want to consider how this relates to my yoga practice. There are certain points in my practice where my body leads me where it wants to go, where my mind is just following the lead dancer which is the lived body/emotions. These practices are the ones that feel really deep, and releasing. In Anusara by focusing on a theme and connecting that theme to physical actions we try to bypass the mind and go straight through the body to the heart/emotions.

133- Structure of culture determines the way that Leib is perceived, “it frames, determines or even restricts our perception, awareness, and consciouness of the Leib”> it hinders leib in its self expression.

Methodology: Understanding leib requires intimacy between researcher and informant (133). Leib can’t be thought of, it must be experienced. This calls for an approach with leib research where one goes beyond participant observations to “experiencing participation” (134).

I really agree with this, and think I’m in the perfect position with yoga to do this. I am already in a position of closeness and intimacy with the practice myself and with other practitioners. Most people I want to interview see my primarily as a yoga practitioner/teacher and secondarily as a student of anthropology. Use this in my methods section to argue why I’m of value for this research.

Emotion and Society’s Body- Lyon and Barbalet

Not a super clear article- doesn’t provide good framework to work with. But do offer some useful definitions and ideas…

Lyon and Barbalet’s  piece in Csordas (1994) argues that it is “through emotion (feeling/sentiment/affect) that the links between the body and the social world can be clearly drawn” (48). It is through emotion that the body is intercommunicative and active (48).

They use the term emotion to refer to “sense, including bodily sense, of evaluating experience” (57).

“Emotion activates distinct dispositions, postures and movements which are not only attitudinal but also physical, involving the way way in which individual bodies together with others articulate a common purpose, design, or order.”

The authors see the body as an agent in the social world, and highlight this omission in the work of Foucault, who sees society as acting on the body, and the body as an outcome of social processes (49). Using the examples of the consumerist body and the medical body, they do acknolwedge how the body can be pacified by society, and acted upon. The consumerist body is the one that we cloth, feed, exercise (making it more relavent for my study involving yoga). This body is a post-industrial, post-labouring body and is a body that has become the passive object of exchange. This body is an outward expression of self, it is primarily for others. Although this is a predominant body in society, it is not the only one and does not take away our sense of embodiment and our capacity for agency through the body. “The human capacity for social agency, to collectively and individually contribute to the making of the social world, comes precisely from the person’s lived experience of embodiment” (54). Another body that L and B describe is the “corporate/collective” body (55). Social collective action such as prayer in church or army marches (or yoga classes) generate collective and individual feeling/emotion through engaging the body in certain ways.  Through emotion people’s activity has practical direction and force (57).

Distinguish feeling from emotion. Feeling refers to the body as possessed and passive: “My foot hurts”. Vs emotion “I am in pain” (emotion refers to the body as self- embodied).

Like everyone, cite Merleau-Ponty- body as agent of experience. Body as ground of experience> through the body we gain access to the world.

the body “mediates biological and social processes” (51)

Emotion is key in their argument of the body as subject and agent. It is emotion that moves a person through bodily processes, they see emotion is the source of agency.

Csordas – Embodiment and Cultural Phenomenology (142 in Weiss)

Csordas – Embodiment and Cultural Phenomenology (142 in Weiss)

phenomenology |fiˌnäməˈnäləjē|noun Philosophy the science of phenomena as distinct from that of the nature of being.• an approach that concentrates on the study of consciousness and the objects of direct experience.

-Csordas cites Leenhardt, anth who studied the Canaques- one informant believed that the europeans brought the concept of the body to them. Prior to Euro dominance the body was neither subject or object (144)

Important basic questions Csordas asks (144):

- is the body a determinant object, or must it somehow be considered a subject as well?

-is biology itself determinant, or does it somehow change along with out knowledge of it?

- if we object to the idea that the body is a tabula rasa upon which culture inscribes its meaning, should we base that objection on the argument that biology gives us disposition and temperament prior to culture, or on the argument that the body is never a tabula rasa because it is always already cultural as well as biological in the first place?

Leenhardt’s work suggests- “the person as a cultural category depends on the way people inhabit their bodies, perhaps other domains of culture are grounded in bodiliness.” (144)

“the body, then, as a biological, material entity and embodiment as an indeterminant methodological field defined by perceptual experience and by mode of presence and engagement in the world” (145)

- text metaphor- body as text, inscription of culture on the body, reading the body (146)

-Csordas describes Merleau-Ponty- “perception is basic bodily experience, where the body is not an object but a subject, and where embodiment is the condition for us to have any objects- that is, to objectify reality-in the first place” (147). “Culture does not reside only in objects and representations, but also in bodily processes of perception by which those representations come into being. These creative processes are closely bound up with intentionality….  ”semiotics gives us textuality in order to understand representation, phenomenology gives us embodiment in order to understand being-in-the-world.”

studying culture and self in terms of embodiment, just as we can study culture and self in terms of texuality – “paradigm of embodiment” see Csordas 1990

Research direction from Csordas:

How to study embodiment- “there is no special kind of data or method for eliciting such data, but a methodological attitude that demands attention to bodiliness even in purely verbal data such as written text or oral interview.” “Embodiment is neither about behavior nor essence per se, but about experience and subjectivity, and understanding these is a function of interpreting action in different modes and expression in different idioms” (148).

-studying embodiment isn’t limited to disease- teaches about broader issues of self, emotion, religion, meaning, transformation, social interaction, institutional control of experience, and the human interface with technology (149)

-cites Michael Jackson 1989- his “analysis of initiation rituals and bodily metaphors illustrates the theme ‘that ideas have to be tested against the whole of our experience-sense perceptions as well as moral values, scientific aims as well as communal goals”‘(1989:14)

-”reflexive- author figures into the text in a self conscious way and teh text includes a dialogue with the voice of the indigene”

embodiment = shift from representation > being-in-the-world

-perhaps best elaborated in the cultural study of health

TOWARD A CULTURAL PHENOMENOLOGY- to flesh out a methodological standpoint to analyze culture and self from the standpoint of embodiment.

- somatic modes of attention: “culturally elaborated ways of attending to and with one’s body in surroundings that include the embodied presence of others. examples: ritual healing where healers come to know about health of patients through direct inspiration not being told. Healer may feel heat, see things, or hear things. (151)

-embodied imagery- can be visual, kinesthetic, proprioceptive, aditory, olfactory imagery. often linked. gives example of catholic healer who laid hands on man’s head with brain tumor and felt the tumor shrinking under his hands and also had an image of it shrinking (i’ve heard similar stories with reiki). “this example highlights the intimate connection between touch and sight in a way that appeals directly to the notion of embodiment as the existential ground of culture and self” (154).

- “deployment of senses and sensibility, not only their content, is emphatically cultural” (155)

- 155 – embodied metaphor

- 155 – cites Kirmayer (1992: 380) “bodily metaphors are often enactive rather than representational, and that embodied meaning is to be found primarily in “modes of action or ways of life”

questions and thoughts:

- talk to Jasmin about phenomenology, still a bit confused about the concept.

- definitely need to look at Csordas’ book Embodiment and Experience

- look more into concept of “embodied metaphor”- Jenkins and Valiente 1994 (“Bodily Transactions of the Passions” in Csordas Embodiment and Experience) describe women experience of intense heat somewhere between physical burning and emotional anger/fear. This reminds me of the physical discomforts that are linked to emotional descriptions by yoga practitioners. Could this become the major point of focus of my research? I have experienced this back pain, i can talk to GV about her should pain, AH has experienced this in backbends with chest pains. GPen has talked about this in her chest. Probably many others have stories.

- look for Kirmayer 1989 “Mind and Body as Metaphors” in Lock Biomedicine Examined. or 1992 “The Body’s Insistence on Meaning: Metaphor as Presentation and Representation in Illness Experience” Med Anth Quart 6:323-46

Weiss and Haber- Perspectives on Embodiment

xiii- shift from talking about body to embodiment- “shift from viewing the body as nongendered, prediscursive phenomenon that plays a central role in perception, cognition, action, and nature to a “way” of living or inhabiting the world through one’s acculturated body.”

so embodiment is defined as the WAY we inhabt the world- its like attitude or intention/quality of heart- may or may not be conscious. perhaps through yoga we make our embodiment more intentional?

Positioning Yoga

Strauss’ work focuses on Sivananda yoga which is quite different in structure, history and content than the forms of yoga that i practice and study.  To see it seems much less appealing and sexy to a Western audience due to the sanskrit names of teachers, the complex lineages, several controversies- basically it screams New Age hippy.

Strauss addresses most of these stereotypes in her book. Her focus is on Sivanada yoga in the global context as a transnational community. She also considers how yoga as a whole has been affected by its dissembination across boundaries.

Much of her work isn’t relevant to my study, but several aspects will be of use:

- Gender

• indian practitionners 77,
• americans- yoga journal stats from 2003- 89% female readership
• macho yoga 129- celebrities
• diverse representations

- Health

• health as balance 68
• pursuit of fitness and wellness has become a path of individual and moral action” (citing Conrad 1994), to be unhealthy is to be dependent on others (71)
• Balance- one interviewee (74)- “yoga has a balanced effect- my personality is quie unbalanced, its not good, yoga is to balance my mind, my emotions, to get control of my mind, to keep my body strong”.
• another interview- balance emphasized 80
• Dean Ornish- California cardiologists first research yoga and popularize views of its health benefits. “Mainstreaming”
• 116- health is modern commodity> cultural problem.
• 116 Explanations of how yoga works draw on ideas of integrating the self in the multifaceted demands of modern life. create a unified person.
• 117 tool to improve personal and planetary health
• 127- yoga as oasis regime – you don’t have to give up who you are to learn yoga
• 127 health vs fitness > fitness leads to success in modern life

- stress reduction

• need something to counter stress of modern society. for those in serving professions maintaining pleasant, calm appearances can be stressful> turn to yoga (72)

- Bodily idiom (22)

116-117 modern individuals have ability to produce particular kind of body/self (drawing on work of BS Turner 1994)

- New Age/New Social movements/ Modernity

• defines New Aage 118
• 83
• belonging to a community of practice (84) for indians, to regain lost traditions. Conversely for Westerns its a way to “find oneself”
• shared community of practice 90- by keeping schedule and way of life
• found that yoga practitioners she encountered were primarily involved in substantial service to others. yoga was one part of their lifestyle. “they are certainly not saints, but their individual actions do tend to demonstrate a greater sensitivity to existing socioeconomic and political imbalances”. Stereotype of nature loving yogis has some validity- “individuals who have restructured their lives to include intensive bodily practices like yoga are in fact also more likely to make other tangible changes toward increasingly sustainable lifestyles and provision of services to those less fortunate, with an eye to shifting the existing balance of power” (101). Personal transformation can lead to social transformation.
• 100- spiritual organization as self serving- resproduce exploitative social relationships, yet still the lifestyle of yoga may have an effect.
• Turnerian “communitas”- sense of oneness without regard for socially imposed structural difference (turner 1987 (1969)).
• yoga as corrective to modernity> progressive uptopian remaking of the world.
• 129- yoga is antidote to “bad” aspects of modernity, such as stress and busyness. quote from jerry seinfeld about how yoga helps him do more.
• new age as modern endeavor 133
• REFLEXIVITY (133)- characteristic of late modern thinking. our ability to consciously reflect on and respond to conditions of our making. also self actualization.
• 139- gets mushy at the end- yoga makes for a better global community.
• 140 yoga is beyond physical, its a state of mind and thinking, about being in harmony with nature (true for Anusara too)>  also true for health
• 143- “yoga like modernity is an attitude, a way of being in the world”

Writing ethnography

• 88- multilocal ethnography (Marcus)- start with a single location and out of it examine cultural flows

Linking yoga and environmental consciousness

- pg 115.

Yoga as Ritual and Belief

Paper i wrote for anth 311 on yoga, bolded parts may have significance for this research- especially in terms of short term transformation, transformational spaces, social spaces, interaction of teachers and students, body image, reason for doing yoga, symbolism

Leena Miller

Anth 311, Prof. Lyons

March 18, 2009

Yoga is a practice of Eastern spirituality that is gaining increasing popularity in the West. While many Westerners think of their yoga practice as secular, yoga classes retain many ritual elements. I am a certified yoga instructor and I teach a number of classes each week in studios and community centres. When I teach, it is important for me to differentiate yoga from mere physical exercise by incorporating elements of ritual. This paper will explore the significance of these rituals and relate them to theoretical concepts in the Anthropology of Religion.

In her paper “Transcendental Meditation, Reiki and Yoga: Suffering, Ritual and Self-Transformation,” Garrett, a sociologist as well as yoga practitioner, examines yoga as a form of ritual in Western contexts. She claims that “rituals are often used as initiations from one form of subjectivity to another” and that practitioners approach yoga, as a ritual, as a means of self-transformation (Garrett 2001:329). I often ask my students why they choose to take yoga classes. Although some of my students come seeking physical transformation in the form of weight loss or relief from physical pain, the majority are seeking transformations of their mental state: to reduce stress, relieve anxiety, or find a sense of calmness. An even broader transformation may be sought: to ‘work on myself,’ to learn acceptance, reconnect with ‘something bigger’ or ‘move towards closer union with the divine.’

Garrett says that yoga is “a constant process of initiation, an ongoing training devoted to deepening knowledge of the body,” and then, according to its philosophical roots in Hinduism, to ultimately transcend the body (337). As a process of initiation and transformation, a yoga class may be considered a rite of passage and would thus fit into van Gennep’s (2002:130) model for the stages of ritual rites of passage. Using a typical yoga class that I teach at a studio I will explain van Gennep’s three stages of ritual: separation, liminality, and incorporation. Turner, who has also developed important theories of ritual, defines ritual more narrowly than I do in this paper. However, his emphasis on symbols has influenced my analysis of yoga as a ritual. For Turner, rituals must involve spirits or mystical beings. While this may be the case for some yoga practitioners but it is not the norm. Turner (2002:123) finds that among the Ndembu, “Each kind of ritual may be regarded as a configuration of symbols.” Turner also emphasized the study of the dynamics of social interactions.  It is through ritual symbols that social interactions are made possible and maintained (Hicks 2002:122). In a yoga class, gestures, postures and the use of metaphorical language symbolize what the individual should experience and what the experience of relationship between student and teacher in the class should be.

In van Gennep’s first stage of ritual, separation, the individual is removed from their original state.  The yoga student enters the yoga studio space and changes into yoga clothing (typically form fitting, comfortable, stretchy cotton). They separate themselves further from their everyday state when they enter the yoga room: they become more quiet, collect the necessary props for the class such as blocks to sit on, and unroll their yoga mat on the floor which creates their delineated space upon which they will ‘do yoga.’ I, the teacher, motion that class will begin by sitting down at the front of the room, facing my students. I begin by instructing my students in how to take a seated position with good posture. I then invite them to close their eyes and become aware of how they are feeling, noticing the thoughts and feelings they have brought with them to the practice. I invite them to turn their awareness inwards to their breath, shifting the focus away from those thoughts and feelings. This is a period of transition, of coming into a greater awareness of the body and mind.

Next we enter into the liminal stage, in which van Gennep (2002:130) says that clear-cut status is lost, we are “in between.” In a yoga class, this phase is the bulk of the class, where I lead students through postures, called asanas. Before beginning the asana practice, I lead the class in singing the sound of aum together three times. I have been taught that sound is the original sound of the universe, and in singing it we reconnect with the Universal Source of energy for our practice. In beginner classes, often no one or only few will sing along with me in the aums. In classes with students that have been with me for several months more students join in. Usually if a few loud people sing out, others will join in also. If it is a more advanced class, a chant is also sung. The chant in Sanskrit that I teach my students is typically sung at classes taught in the Anusara style of yoga:

Om Namah Shivaya Gurave

I offer myself to the Light, the Auspicious One, who is the True Teacher within and without,

Saccidananda Murtaye

Who assumes the forms of Reality, Consciousness, and Bliss

Nischprapanchaya Shantaya

Who is never absent and is full of peace,

Niralambaya Tejase

Independent in existence, the vital essence of Illumination.

The aums and chant underscore liminality because students are invited to let go of their previous ego-centred self. They connect to a Universal Source of energy/The Light/The True Teacher through the chanting of aum or by singing a chant like the one above and they join their voice with the teacher and other students. It is important to note, that although these more “spiritual” or philosophical parts of the yoga class are offered, not all students participate, some remaining quiet during chanting. As the teacher, I explicitly give the choice to participate by telling students to join in as they like or feel comfortable.

The liminal stage continues as we move into the asanas, the physically active part of the class. Students move together as I instruct. In our day-to-day lives, we choose how and when to move our bodies, at least to some degree. In a yoga class, students defer the freedom to move as they choose; they are in different state where a teacher directs their movement. Many of the asanas, in name and form, invoke symbols in Hindu mythology or embody characteristics of animals. One example is virabhadrasana, or warrior pose, which refers to the Bhagavad-Gita where a symbolic battle is being fought against self-ignorance.  I plan my classes so that asanas fit together in a sequence, poses progressively opening the body and eventually bringing the students into a peak pose, the most difficult pose or sequence of poses that brings the class to a climax physically and emotionally. Then I follow with postures that are gentler, preparing students for final relaxation. The final pose is savasana, which is translated as corpse pose. Students lie on their backs, with palms facing up for about five to ten minutes. During savasana I encourage students to let the body go completely; there should be no effort in the pose. I also instruct them how to gradually let the mind go, trying to suspend the busyness of thinking for several minutes. This pose can be seen as a symbolic end to the liminal stage in which the old self dies.

The last phase of van Gennep’s triad is incorporation; it begins as we end savasana. Students are awakened from their relaxation (not sleep) gently by the sound of a bell. While still in the lying on their backs, I invite students to become aware of their breath, and then slowly bring movement back into their bodies. Next, I tell students to roll onto their right side, and “check in with how you are feeling:” noticing the breath, sensations in the body, thoughts in the mind, and emotions. Then I invite students to slowly move into the cross-legged seated posture that we began with at the start of class. Here students have entered into a new state; it is often evident from their body language that they are more relaxed and peaceful than when they began. I invite students to again close their eyes and bring their focus to the breath, becoming aware of how their bodies feel in the new state. We then sing the sound of aum together one time. The class ends when I say the word namaste with my palms together in a prayer position over my heart; at the end of the word I take my hands to my forehead bowing to my students and they do the same bowing to me and one another. In India namaste is a common greeting that literally means “I bow to you,” but in yoga classes (at least in the West) we translate it as meaning “the light within me honours the light within you.” The meaning assigned to this word in yoga classes is significant. It signifies the transformation that has occurred throughout the class, whereby the individual transcends their small self (ego) and connects with something larger, a “light” or “spirit” that is thought to reside in all.

Human action, according to Leach, serves two purposes: to do things, “altering the physical state of the world,” or to “say things,” communicate information, particularly information about human relationships (Leach 2002:118). Leach argues that the term ritual is “best used to denote this communicative aspect of behavior” (119). Yoga alters the physical state of students, providing exercise as well as relaxation. Yoga has come to signify a number of things in our society: health, relaxation, the East. In taking yoga classes individuals might be communicating their interest in improving their health, their need for stress-reduction, their desire to be more self aware or their curiosity about “Eastern” or “New Age” spirituality.

The symbols within a yoga class also communicate important information about students and their relationship with each other and with the teacher, and also about the transformation of the ego through yoga. Turner (2002:124) explains that symbols in Ndembu ritual “connects the unknown to the known.”  In the process of ritual, the “unknown, invisible, hidden” may be revealed and in turn what is private may be made public, what is personal may be made social. Among the Ndembu this process allows social tensions that may at other times threaten the cohesion and continuity of the group to be expressed in ritual and dealt with in a socially acceptable way. These processes, of revealing the unknown, hidden and invisible occur on several levels in a yoga class.

The first unknown is the body. There are few contexts in the West when we are encouraged to actually pay attention and be aware of our bodies, especially in the context of a group. In a yoga class, I teach students to become aware of their breath and how it changes and affects movement, of the way that the body moves within space, and of the way that parts of the body move in relation to one another. I also encourage students to allow bodily processes that are normally expected to be hidden in social situations to be exposed throughout the class; for example, by telling students that it is normal for certain poses to cause them to pass gas. (One instance is pavanamuktasana, a supine pose, where one knee is drawn into the chest. The Sanskrit word pavana means air or wind and mukta means release, therefore this is the “wind relieving posture” and often releases trapped gas in the intestines). Another example is that I ask my female students to tell me when they are on their menstrual cycle as it is beneficial to modify some asanas at during this time. Here women are asked to reveal to a group of other students whom they may not know at all a matter that is normally expected to be kept private and cleanly concealed. In yoga classes the teacher creates a space in which students can experience their bodies and even reveal aspects of their bodies in ways that are not normally socially sanctioned. Here the private realm of the body is experienced publicly. However, there is a contrast from Turner’s theory of Ndembu ritual here. Turner argues that by expression of anti-social sentiment in ritual contexts, individuals “are purged of rebellious wishes and emotions and willing to conform once more to public mores” (2002:124). Although I don’t think my students will start passing gas in other public contexts due to their yoga studies, it is my hope, and I think the hope of many teachers that through yoga students will become more comfortable sharing about specific functions such as menstruation, and become more aware of their bodies and their health in general.

Several of the components in the ritual of a yoga class symbolize what is happening to the ego. These symbols, which are acted out physically and verbally, make public and social the more personal or private psychological experience of transcending the ego.  Students come to a class as individuals, with their egos intact. In the separation phase they prepare themselves to begin to transcend the ego. In the liminal phase the teacher guides them through this process by performing asanas, such as virabhadrasana, which may symbolize the battle to defeat the ego.

The final asana, corpse pose, is a symbolic death of the ego, after which the student is reborn in a state of oneness with the other students and the teacher, so that they are all carrying the same light within themselves.  Richard Rosen (2009), a well-respected yoga teacher and author, writes, “In Corpse Pose, we symbolically ‘die’ to our old ways of thinking and doing. The normally perceived boundaries of body image dissolve, and we enter a state of blissful neutrality.” This state of oneness is communicated by the gesture and vocalization of namaste that ends the class. Aadil Palkhivala, a prominent teacher in the Iyengar style of yoga explains, “For a teacher and student, Namaste allows two individuals to come together energetically to a place of connection and timelessness, free from the bonds of ego-connection” (2009). This word is a symbol that communicates the relationship between student and teacher. Palkhivala continues, “If it is done with deep feeling in the heart and with the mind surrendered, a deep union of spirits can blossom.” This symbolic gesture and word reveals a common sentiment between students and teacher that may otherwise be hidden, and that is normally only expressed between individuals who are in very close relationship.

Van Gennep’s model for the phases of ritual provide a viable framework for examining the journey of letting go of the ego and coming into a peaceful state of oneness that is an underlying goal of yoga. Yoga differs from Turner’s theories of ritual in some respects, but his insights to symbolism in ritual apply to yoga in a number of ways, particularly as pertains to processes of revelation and making the private public and the personal social. In contrast to Turner’s perception of ritual as a bounded event in time, the practice of yoga forms a ritual that can continue to influence the individual’s mental and physical state long after the ritual actions are over. Many students report a sense of mental clarity and physical well-being that persist through the remainder of the day after a yoga session. For some, yoga begins to approach the status of religion in their lives. I practice yoga regularly every morning, as many people might begin their day with scripture reading or prayer. Yoga becomes a resource to turn to in times of stress and anxiety, and a means to celebrate on a joyful sunny morning. In fact, yoga has become so integrated into my life that I will often do a sequence of poses as a study break, or while I am having a relaxed conversation with friends. This practice might be compared to the pervasiveness of prayer in the life of a devoted Christian, Jew or Muslim. In a functionalist sense, yoga and its accompanying philosophy provides much the same framework for understanding the world and interpreting events as any established religion. In this way, it surpasses merely the practice of ritual and encompasses the realm of belief as well.

References

Garrett, Catherine

2001 Transcendental Meditation, Reiki and Yoga: Suffering, Ritual, and Self-Transformation. Journal of Contemporary Religion 16(3):329-342.

Hicks, David, ed.

2002 Ritual and Belief. Second ed. Boston: McGraw Hill.

Leach, Edmund

2002 Ritual. In Ritual and Belief. David Hicks, ed. Pp. 114-121. Boston: McGraw Hill.

Palkhivala, Aadil

2009 The Meaning of “Namaste”. Electronic documnt, http://www.yogajournal.com.proxy.lib.uwaterloo.ca/basics/822.

Rosen, Richard

2009 The Purpose of Corpse Pose. Electronic documnt, http://www.yogajournal.com.proxy.lib.uwaterloo.ca/basics/824.

Turner, Victor

2002 Ritual Symbolism, Morality, and Social Structure among the Ndembu. In Ritual and Belief. David Hicks, ed. Pp. 122-129. Boston: McGraw Hill.

van Gennep, Arnold

2002 Conclusions. In Ritual and Belief. David Hicks, ed. Pp. 129-133. Boston: McGraw             Hill.

Garrett

Garrett, Catherine

2001 Transcendental Meditation, Reiki and Yoga: Suffering, Ritual, and Self-Transformation. Journal of Contemporary Religion 16(3):329-342.

In her paper “Transcendental Meditation, Reiki and Yoga: Suffering, Ritual and Self-Transformation,” Garrett, a sociologist as well as yoga practitioner, examines yoga as a form of ritual in Western contexts. She claims that “rituals are often used as initiations from one form of subjectivity to another” and that practitioners approach yoga, as a ritual, as a means of self-transformation (Garrett 2001:329).

Garrett says that yoga is “a constant process of initiation, an ongoing training devoted to deepening knowledge of the body,” and then, according to its philosophical roots in Hinduism, to ultimately transcend the body (337).

Methodology: Garretts work is a good example for me methodologically. She takes an emic approach that “proceeds inductively from the author’s experience.” She emphasizes that its important for researchers to acknoweldge how personal experience motivates research (329). She claims her reflection dissolves that false division between academics and personal life/leisure, public and private, intellectual and physical life. She uses her achademic training to explore personal experience of pain and illness. She is “interested in how chronic pain lead people to new ways of being” (330) and how yoga (along with Reiki and TM) can be seen as a ritual performed in the quest to end suffering.  ”Search is not to escape painful reality, but to transform it” (330)/

Cites Elaine Scarry, The Body in Pain, summarizing her idea that “physical pain destroys meaning, since pain has no object…. therfore the opposite of pain must be creativity. Every human act of ‘making’ is a movement away from pain. The antidote to pain is imagination: our ablity to make meaning.” But Garrett diverges from Scarry who sees movement away from pain as movement away from the body. Garrett uses the physical practice of yoga as an example of “moving back into my body and imaging that body, and consequently myself, in new ways” (330).

Emotions and Yoga: Practices Iyengar Yoga. Was attracted to yoga to experience the body in new ways, never had been athletic. Did not start yoga with physical gut pain issues in mind.  In her experience yoga poses illicit emotional responses (anger, sadness, aggravation…) because emotions are stored in the body and “are release when you become conscious of the body space where they have been locked.”

Mullis Reflection

Mullis, Eric C.  2008 “The Image of the Performing Body” Journal of Aesthetic Education. Vol 42 No 4. pg 62- 77

In “The Image of the Performing Body” Mullis considers how the body is transformed into an aesthetically expressive medium. Though his work specifically considers dancers and actors, he provides useful explanations of experiences of embodiment that can be applied to the practice of yoga. Mullis explains the process through which the body acquires physical skill using the notions of “body schema” and “body image.”

Mullis cites the work of Shaun Gallagher who defines body image as “a complex set of intentional states and dispositions—perceptions, beliefs, and attitudes—in which the intentional object is one’s own body” (2008:62). Mullis breaks body image into three components: body percept, body concept, and body affect. “Perception gives me a sense of the condition of my body at any point in time, while conceptions build upon perceptual content and allow one to understand the nature of one’s embodiment” (63).

Mullis also highlights how body image, particularly body percept and concept are highly influenced by cultural and societal standards of beauty, fitness, health. The ways in which our bodies are “invested with emotion” is also culturally influenced, claims Mullis (63).

Body schema as first defined by Head and Holmes in 1911, is the subconscious postural model of the body. “Body scheme functions by continually comparing the body’s present posture to those held in the immediate past. That is, at the preconscious level, schema provides a standard against which changes in posture can be judged” (63).  Mullis gives the example of moving to answer the phone- the body automatically knows how to get up and move to the phone, if you had to think about how to make every little movement you’d never get to the phone on time.

Body schema provides the following functions (64):

1. Input> processes information about posture and movement- inputs information from vestibular (balance), articular (joints), cutaneous (skin), muscular, and kinetic (motion) sources – input proprioceptive information
2. Output> motor programs both innate (reflexes) and learned (swinging tennis racket or leaping), Motor programs are elicited by the environment- just like riding a bike- they come back to you when you need them
3. translates visual information into proprioceptive information- if teacher demonstrates something and says do it like this the body can respond. This is essential for communication

Body schema feeds into body image, providing information for its formation (64).

(this relates to Anusara- in Anusara we’re re-aligning the body by becoming conscious of our subconscious postural schema’s and training the body to do something different.  Mullis stresses that “body schema functions below the surface of consciousness and, unlike the body image, does not include perceptions, attitudes, or beliefs about the body and is consequently not subject to cultural influence” (so is this like optimal blueprint in Anusara?)

Teaching movement :

Mullis explains that though body schema is normally preconscious, it can enter consciousness. This happens when the body is learning a new motor skill. Mullis quotes Gallagher to illustrate, “the dancer or athlete who practices long and hard to make deliberate movements proficient so that movement is finally accomplished by the body without conscious reflection uses a consciousness of bodily movement to train the body-schematic performance.” “Proprioceptive information (especially visual and kinaesthetic) is used to develop schemata that, in time, will be automatically elicited by the environment.

To educate the body or alter the body schema the body image (perceptual information) must be used. To body image and schema are interconnected.  Body schema can affect the body image, “preconscious postural model of the body affects one’s conscious experience of the body. Changes in mobility, disease, accident affect perceptual experience of the body. Also, studies show (67) that individuals who engage in lots of physical activity tend to be more positive about their bodies- “control of movement can influence one’s body affect”.  In physical activity (Mullis says performance art, but I argue for yoga too) the body is transformed into both an expressive instrument, but also the quality of perceptual and affective experience of the body is developed. This in turn can affect a person’s experience of an environment.

Effortless performance (69)

Talking about how performers communicate physically- communicative gesture is contingent upon interaction between performers and audience. The movement itself is meaningless, but because a communicate space (72) is developed meaning is assigned. Same in a yoga class- a teacher creates a communicative space where movements and expressions are assigned meaning. (“like your inner body be bright like the sun in shining in your heart”). Yoga teachers ask students to convey a certain attitude through their movement, which the instructor assigns- having fingers open wide conveys an attitude of radiance.

Mullis concludes that performance arts (and I think yoga too) “entail transforming the body by consciously developing the functions of the body schema…. Ultimately, this transformation entails using intention to consciously develop functions that normally take place below the level of consciousness” (74). > this makes body become an aesthetically valuable (for performance arts). For yoga this is how yoga becomes a vehicle of personal and spiritual transformation.

“Body schema acts as the intermediary between conscious intent and realization of specific goals” (74)

reading list

Arthur Klienmen- PTSD and depression, embodiment

Deluz and Gaulttan- social theory of mental illness as metaphor for world

Judith Bulter- feminist theorist

Hillary Radner- feminist- Shopping Around- describes embodiment, perceiving bodies. make-up as practice of embodiment. Resilience, bodies in control- functioning bodies

Helena Wolf- women and ballet

From Beyond the Body Proper, check out:

- Merleau-Ponty, Benjamin, Hacking, Bulter, Latour, Miller, Lock

From Garrett check out:

Williams, Frank, Grosz, Embodiment and Experience: The Existential Ground of Culture and Self, Lupton- The Emotional Self, Mellor and Shilling, Worlds of Illness: Biographical and Cultural Perspectives on Health and Disease by Radley,