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Keeping Together in Time
Could something as simple and seemingly natural as falling into step have marked us for evolutionary success? In Keeping Together in Time one of the most widely read and respected historians in America pursues the possibility that coordinated rhythmic movement--and the shared feelings it evokes--has been a powerful force in holding human groups together.As he has done for historical phenomena as diverse as warfare, plague, and the pursuit of power, William H. McNeill brings a dazzling breadth and depth of knowledge to his study of dance and drill in human history. From the records of distant and ancient peoples to the latest findings of the life sciences, he discovers evidence that rhythmic movement has played a profound role in creating and sustaining human communities. The behavior of chimpanzees, festival village dances, the close-order drill of early modern Europe, the ecstatic dance-trances of shamans and dervishes, the goose-stepping Nazi formations, the morning exercises of factory workers in Japan--all these and many more figure in the bold picture McNeill draws. A sense of community is the key, and shared movement, whether dance or military drill, is its mainspring. McNeill focuses on the visceral and emotional sensations such movement arouses, particularly the euphoric fellow-feeling he calls "muscular bonding." These sensations, he suggests, endow groups with a capacity for cooperation, which in turn improves their chance of survival.
A tour de force of imagination and scholarship, Keeping Together in Time reveals the muscular, rhythmic dimension of human solidarity. Its lessons will serve us well as we contemplate the future of the human community and of our various local communities.
A tour de force of imagination and scholarship, Keeping Together in Time reveals the muscular, rhythmic dimension of human solidarity. Its lessons will serve us well as we contemplate the future of the human community and of our various local communities.
216 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1995
22 people are currently reading
1230 people want to read
About the author
William H. McNeill
122 books208 followersWilliam Hardy McNeill was a historian and author, noted for his argument that contact and exchange among civilizations is what drives human history forward, first postulated in The Rise of the West (1963). He was the Robert A. Milikan Distinguished Service Professor Emeritus of History at the University of Chicago, where he taught from 1947 until his retirement in 1987.
In addition to winning the U.S. National Book Award in History and Biography in 1964 for The Rise of the West, McNeill received several other awards and honors. In 1985 he served as president of the American Historical Association.
In 1996, McNeill won the prestigious Erasmus Prize, which the Crown Prince of the Netherlands Willem-Alexander presented to him at Amsterdam's Royal Palace.
In 1999, Modern Library named The Rise of the West of the 100 Best Nonfiction Books of the 20th century.
In 2009, he won the National Humanities Medal. In February 2010, President Barack Obama, a former University of Chicago professor himself, awarded McNeill the National Humanities Medal to recognize "his exceptional talent as a teacher and scholar at the University of Chicago and as an author of more than 20 books, including The Rise of the West: A History of the Human Community (1963), which traces civilizations through 5,000 years of recorded history".
In addition to winning the U.S. National Book Award in History and Biography in 1964 for The Rise of the West, McNeill received several other awards and honors. In 1985 he served as president of the American Historical Association.
In 1996, McNeill won the prestigious Erasmus Prize, which the Crown Prince of the Netherlands Willem-Alexander presented to him at Amsterdam's Royal Palace.
In 1999, Modern Library named The Rise of the West of the 100 Best Nonfiction Books of the 20th century.
In 2009, he won the National Humanities Medal. In February 2010, President Barack Obama, a former University of Chicago professor himself, awarded McNeill the National Humanities Medal to recognize "his exceptional talent as a teacher and scholar at the University of Chicago and as an author of more than 20 books, including The Rise of the West: A History of the Human Community (1963), which traces civilizations through 5,000 years of recorded history".
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Displaying 1 - 19 of 19 reviews
March 11, 2017
This was published in 1995 and is available online under an academic POD scheme.
McNeills idea is that unified muscular action on the part of human groups, whether through dance, drill, calisthenics, or via some other means, plays a vital role in forming group solidarity in human societies, and that the effects of this keeping together in time have been used at various times, sometimes as a source of emotional resilience in societies under stress, and at other times as a kind of battery or power source for successful or expansionist societies.
He says a bit more than that, his initial observations are very interesting and the more reality-based aspects to his argument are compelling, but he has a flaky mind and slips easily into totalising statements and generalities more typical of the 70's than the 90's.
The strongest part of his argument is that certain kinds of work in which the muscular effort of large numbers of people are focused upon a narrow area, like a series of blacksmiths combining to beat a piece of metal in rhythm, or sailors pulling on a rope, or where all the bodies are not focused on one object but are arranged closely in space and performing the same action at the same time, like planters in a field or infantry on a battlefield, is either only possible, or massively enhanced when people act together in time.
McNeil would claim that this capacity is unique to man. or at least, he would say that the ability to move together in time, as a group, to music, is unique to man. Animals do flock and move as one, but not to music, and I do not think they manipulate as one.
The idea of this kind of very precise uniform rhythm being a uniquely human quality is fascinating to me. It lead me to consider if perhaps movement, or the body and it actions, are not the original syntax to language and that just as written and printed communication colonised verbal and spoke communication, absorbing its forms and then only slowly altering them, perhaps spoken language similarly absorbed the nature of muscular syntax, first simply emphasising motion like a tennis players grunt, then developing in complexity, then learning to create verbally the context and complexity that previously could be provided only by the body, and then expanding into new potentialities of description unbound by the body, but still ultimately rooted in it.
This would mean the existence of a pre-oral human culture that provided its basis.
Anyway, McNeill talks first about the importance of muscular bonding in small communities and in unified work, then goes on to religion and then finally to war and politics, essentially moving forward in time through all of these.
It's during the religion statement that we get the real motherload of surprisingly confident assertations and totalising statements. These are never frustrating, McNeil is a large hearted outgoing totalizer rather than a reductionist cutter-off, in which case his slight flakiness would be much more offensive, but he's still probably wrong about a fair amount of the specific stuff he says.
If McNeil is right in everything he says then muscular bonding is the secret engine behind almost every major shift in human culture, the rise and fall of empires and the identity of nations.
His work on religion is fascinating though, there seems to be a deep, permanent, continual and endless struggle for power between the head and the body in world religion. Powerful new forms of religious expression and feeling are continually being developed, often linked to complex emergent forms of muscular bonding that relate the transcendent directly through the movements of the body, then they become successful, then the hierarchy tries to tame or repress all the uncontrolled movement that originally went along with the first explosion of expression, then it happens all over again.
The body, it seems, is not just immediate, animal and rooted in the present, which we probably already suspected, but also timeless, outside cause and consequence, capable of directly connecting with the higher realities through movement. Dance as prayer. It is belief rooted in the people, emerging from their practice, often ignoring or escaping known structures of power and control.
The head by comparison, is highly aware of time and extremely aware of authority and hierarchy. It prefers to reach the godhead through introversion and separation from the body and it is continually frustrated that people keep. fucking. _dancing_ and moving around in an irregular way.
The head is rather unaware of the achievements of the body and tends to either edit them out of its histories or just ignore them. Something carried on to the present day when we compare the staggering shitload of stuff we know about words and our comparative poverty of knowledge about movement and its place in our history and development, despite it certainly being more central and vital than words.
The chapter of politics on war looks at the development, and loss of close-order-drill (the Spartans were very dancy, Athenians refused to learn drill properly as messed with their individuality), then the loss or degradation of drill as a military technique, then its recovery in the early modern period and its effects in China and Europe.
Close-Order drill being part of a feedback loop with certain aspects of civilisation makes a lot of sense. The way it interrelates with the formation of a mass military identity, and the sometimes unpredictable way that interrelates with power structures, is interesting.
He also takes time to look at the development of callisthenics in the modern period and this is a little gem. We get to see the very different ways national cultures adopt (or refuse to adopt) the principals of civilian mass movement. The Germans are into it for masculine reasons. The Brits don’t mind women and the poor doing it but the ruling class prefer team sports. Same in the U.S. The Czechs fucking love it. The French absolutely despise it, and won't do that or sport, unless a bicycle is involved.
It's a fascinating and very short book and I would recommend it for anyone with even a general interest in the subject.
McNeills idea is that unified muscular action on the part of human groups, whether through dance, drill, calisthenics, or via some other means, plays a vital role in forming group solidarity in human societies, and that the effects of this keeping together in time have been used at various times, sometimes as a source of emotional resilience in societies under stress, and at other times as a kind of battery or power source for successful or expansionist societies.
He says a bit more than that, his initial observations are very interesting and the more reality-based aspects to his argument are compelling, but he has a flaky mind and slips easily into totalising statements and generalities more typical of the 70's than the 90's.
The strongest part of his argument is that certain kinds of work in which the muscular effort of large numbers of people are focused upon a narrow area, like a series of blacksmiths combining to beat a piece of metal in rhythm, or sailors pulling on a rope, or where all the bodies are not focused on one object but are arranged closely in space and performing the same action at the same time, like planters in a field or infantry on a battlefield, is either only possible, or massively enhanced when people act together in time.
McNeil would claim that this capacity is unique to man. or at least, he would say that the ability to move together in time, as a group, to music, is unique to man. Animals do flock and move as one, but not to music, and I do not think they manipulate as one.
The idea of this kind of very precise uniform rhythm being a uniquely human quality is fascinating to me. It lead me to consider if perhaps movement, or the body and it actions, are not the original syntax to language and that just as written and printed communication colonised verbal and spoke communication, absorbing its forms and then only slowly altering them, perhaps spoken language similarly absorbed the nature of muscular syntax, first simply emphasising motion like a tennis players grunt, then developing in complexity, then learning to create verbally the context and complexity that previously could be provided only by the body, and then expanding into new potentialities of description unbound by the body, but still ultimately rooted in it.
This would mean the existence of a pre-oral human culture that provided its basis.
Anyway, McNeill talks first about the importance of muscular bonding in small communities and in unified work, then goes on to religion and then finally to war and politics, essentially moving forward in time through all of these.
It's during the religion statement that we get the real motherload of surprisingly confident assertations and totalising statements. These are never frustrating, McNeil is a large hearted outgoing totalizer rather than a reductionist cutter-off, in which case his slight flakiness would be much more offensive, but he's still probably wrong about a fair amount of the specific stuff he says.
If McNeil is right in everything he says then muscular bonding is the secret engine behind almost every major shift in human culture, the rise and fall of empires and the identity of nations.
His work on religion is fascinating though, there seems to be a deep, permanent, continual and endless struggle for power between the head and the body in world religion. Powerful new forms of religious expression and feeling are continually being developed, often linked to complex emergent forms of muscular bonding that relate the transcendent directly through the movements of the body, then they become successful, then the hierarchy tries to tame or repress all the uncontrolled movement that originally went along with the first explosion of expression, then it happens all over again.
The body, it seems, is not just immediate, animal and rooted in the present, which we probably already suspected, but also timeless, outside cause and consequence, capable of directly connecting with the higher realities through movement. Dance as prayer. It is belief rooted in the people, emerging from their practice, often ignoring or escaping known structures of power and control.
The head by comparison, is highly aware of time and extremely aware of authority and hierarchy. It prefers to reach the godhead through introversion and separation from the body and it is continually frustrated that people keep. fucking. _dancing_ and moving around in an irregular way.
The head is rather unaware of the achievements of the body and tends to either edit them out of its histories or just ignore them. Something carried on to the present day when we compare the staggering shitload of stuff we know about words and our comparative poverty of knowledge about movement and its place in our history and development, despite it certainly being more central and vital than words.
The chapter of politics on war looks at the development, and loss of close-order-drill (the Spartans were very dancy, Athenians refused to learn drill properly as messed with their individuality), then the loss or degradation of drill as a military technique, then its recovery in the early modern period and its effects in China and Europe.
Close-Order drill being part of a feedback loop with certain aspects of civilisation makes a lot of sense. The way it interrelates with the formation of a mass military identity, and the sometimes unpredictable way that interrelates with power structures, is interesting.
He also takes time to look at the development of callisthenics in the modern period and this is a little gem. We get to see the very different ways national cultures adopt (or refuse to adopt) the principals of civilian mass movement. The Germans are into it for masculine reasons. The Brits don’t mind women and the poor doing it but the ruling class prefer team sports. Same in the U.S. The Czechs fucking love it. The French absolutely despise it, and won't do that or sport, unless a bicycle is involved.
It's a fascinating and very short book and I would recommend it for anyone with even a general interest in the subject.
March 16, 2021
McNeill does himself a great disservice by burying the vast majority of the evidence & support for his claims in the footnotes, although that certainly aligns with the academic style of writing. Additionally, his evidence is nearly 100% historical and circumstantial; while this is certainly valuable, I think his arguments suffer because he does not engage with scientific literature at any appreciable level. This is particularly true in his chapter on human evolution and the roles that coordinated movement played in that process.
All of that said, this was an interesting overview of the ways that dance and drill have been used throughout history. Since I came to this book from the perspective of a marching musician, the final chapter on the physical aspects of warfare & political power was an enlightening and disturbing reminder of where the activities and arts that I love had their origins---I was maybe the most surprised to learn that gymnastics (which plays a small but perhaps increasing role in the marching arts) also had origins in the militaries of Western powers before becoming an athletic & artistic pursuit in its own right.
This book certainly succeeds at meeting the goals set forth in its introduction, and my issues with the book stem mostly from McNeill working from a historian's perspective and crossing the disciplinary lines which the subject would seem to require (and this is a failing that McNeill does acknowledge as well). Overall it's a solid, if a bit stuffy, jumping-off point into the subject, but it is not the all-encompassing treatise that I was perhaps hoping for from its title and blurbs.
All of that said, this was an interesting overview of the ways that dance and drill have been used throughout history. Since I came to this book from the perspective of a marching musician, the final chapter on the physical aspects of warfare & political power was an enlightening and disturbing reminder of where the activities and arts that I love had their origins---I was maybe the most surprised to learn that gymnastics (which plays a small but perhaps increasing role in the marching arts) also had origins in the militaries of Western powers before becoming an athletic & artistic pursuit in its own right.
This book certainly succeeds at meeting the goals set forth in its introduction, and my issues with the book stem mostly from McNeill working from a historian's perspective and crossing the disciplinary lines which the subject would seem to require (and this is a failing that McNeill does acknowledge as well). Overall it's a solid, if a bit stuffy, jumping-off point into the subject, but it is not the all-encompassing treatise that I was perhaps hoping for from its title and blurbs.
May 8, 2017
The muscular, rhythmic dimension of human sociality is and always has been a powerful force at work among humankind, whether for good or ill. Successive levels of communication-muscular and gestural, then vocal and verbal, then written and mathematical-are what made Homo sapiens the dominant species it has become. Our future, like our past, depends on how we utilize these modes of coordinating common effort for agreed purposes. So far, the human record is one of extraordinary success in wringing more and more food and other forms of energy out of the natural environment. There is no reason to suppose that possibilities of increasing our power over natural flows of matter and energy have been exhausted, or that human inventiveness has ceased to operate. On the contrary, inventiveness can be counted on to exploit sentiments aroused by keeping together in time in the future as in the past. This primitive level of sociality has lost none of its power to create communities, and since we need communities as acutely as ever, opportunities for invention that will help to shape social solidarity in the future are unusually wide open.
Our contemporary disregard of this aspect of human sociality is unwise and probably also unsustainable over the long haul. Time will tell. In the meanwhile it is something to mull over, wonder about, and-for bolder spirits-to experiment with.
Our contemporary disregard of this aspect of human sociality is unwise and probably also unsustainable over the long haul. Time will tell. In the meanwhile it is something to mull over, wonder about, and-for bolder spirits-to experiment with.
to-keep-reference
September 17, 2018...human societies since the beginning of recorded history have used synchronized movement to create harmony and cohesion within groups, sometimes in the service of preparing lor hostilities with other groups. McNeills conclusion suggests that synchronized movement and chanting might be evolved mechanisms for activating I he altruistic motivations created in the process of group selection. The exit emc self-sacrifice characteristic of group-selected species such as ants and bees can often be found among soldiers.
The Happiness Hypothesis Pág.237
The Happiness Hypothesis Pág.237
January 2, 2020
McNeill's thesis is sensible, if somewhat obvious at times. I really appreciated how he made qualified (hedged?) claims about the seeming evolutionary value of various kinds of coordinated movements--war dances, celebrations, moments/rituals of religious ecstasy. Yes, certainly these rituals and movements seal community bonds, make groups more effective at certain tasks, but McNeill sketches examples that are wide and diverse. That diversity and range of examples was impressive, especially in the chapter on religious ceremony. Worth a look--even if you end up skimming parts of the very long final chapter on war/politics.
July 11, 2021
I love the idea of this book. Anthropological considerations of musicality is a fascinating combination for me, and this author's premises fit this kind of thinking. Having lived in several countries with ancient musical and dance traditions, I have seen the ways music and dance seem to strengthen culture and sub-cultures. While I questioned a number of McNeill's assertions, the book was worth the time and sometimes required efforts to push through.
January 19, 2020
This is a very interesting book. It wasn't what I was expecting (a book on the connections between dance and warfare), but is, instead a book on how both dance and military drill (as well as other rhythmic mass activities) have shaped human cultures and ideas of community.
November 6, 2022
Whatever the truth of his speculative elements, whatever to make of his thesis, and despite my personal antipathy to the activities he corrals, this book draws attention to some very interesting facts from human history. Well worth the read.
September 22, 2017
want to believe it so badly i dont care if its true
October 27, 2024
A fascinating book
January 8, 2025
A short but fascinating journey through history focusing on the idea of “muscular bonding.”
January 16, 2017
William Hardy McNeill argues in Keeping Together in Time that dance and close-ordered drill have played an integral role in human socialization throughout world history. He argues that dance/drill (or, "keeping together in time" with rhythmic movements) satisfies a subconscious, irrational, emotional need among humans and promotes subgroup affiliation, "fellow feeling," and communal bonding. McNeill's slim volume was based on a series of lectures he delivered in Europe. While his lectures focused primarily on the relationship between close-order drill and military effectiveness in world history, this volume tries to broaden the thematic analysis to early hunter-gatherer societies, ecstatic religious practice, politics, and war. McNeill does not try to provide definite answers to his hypothesized relationship between rhythmic movement and human bonding, but uses this book as a thought-piece to explore some potentialities for dance playing a prominent role in the rise of civilized humanity. I would suspect that many of his propositions have also become outdated as the evolutionary sciences upon which he bases some of his claims have surely progressed since the 1990s.
Nevertheless, I find the implications of his research intriguing for twentieth-century military history. McNeill proposes that close-order drill plays a prominent role in establishing communal bonding and a sense of comradeship among those who participate in rote exercises during basic training. McNeill remembers experiencing similar feelings of "muscular bonding" [a term McNeill uses as short-hand to describe the increased sense of fellow feeling and subsumption of individual identity into the collective that occurs during sustained rhythmic movements] during his time in the service during the 1940s. In some time periods, McNeill speculates that the social bonds established through routine drill helped solidify bonds of comradeship before men were tested in battle—thus, primary-group cohesion (a.k.a "Band of Brothers") could occur before men ever experienced combat.
This leads to a few interesting questions about the U.S. Army in Vietnam. What happens, then, when recruits are separated from their basic training classes and sent overseas as individuals to replace casualties in active units? While these men would have experienced the "boundary loss" of individual identity during close-order drill and have likely cemented relationships with comrades through rote exercise and rhythmic movement, they surely lost these social benefits of basic training when they were spliced out from basic platoons and sent overseas. As McNeill indicates, it is difficult to quantify or precisely define how dance and drill played a particular role in socialization (especially when abstracted as a general theme in world history) when separated from the plethora of other factors at play. Nevertheless, it would seem that the "muscular bonding" that occurs during basic training certainly played some role in the relative psychological and social well-being of soldiers shipped overseas with their training cohort and those sent abroad as individual replacements.
On the whole, I probably wouldn't recommend this book to most readers, aside from some niche specialties among military historians and world historians . . . and, of course, fans of William H. McNeill.
Nevertheless, I find the implications of his research intriguing for twentieth-century military history. McNeill proposes that close-order drill plays a prominent role in establishing communal bonding and a sense of comradeship among those who participate in rote exercises during basic training. McNeill remembers experiencing similar feelings of "muscular bonding" [a term McNeill uses as short-hand to describe the increased sense of fellow feeling and subsumption of individual identity into the collective that occurs during sustained rhythmic movements] during his time in the service during the 1940s. In some time periods, McNeill speculates that the social bonds established through routine drill helped solidify bonds of comradeship before men were tested in battle—thus, primary-group cohesion (a.k.a "Band of Brothers") could occur before men ever experienced combat.
This leads to a few interesting questions about the U.S. Army in Vietnam. What happens, then, when recruits are separated from their basic training classes and sent overseas as individuals to replace casualties in active units? While these men would have experienced the "boundary loss" of individual identity during close-order drill and have likely cemented relationships with comrades through rote exercise and rhythmic movement, they surely lost these social benefits of basic training when they were spliced out from basic platoons and sent overseas. As McNeill indicates, it is difficult to quantify or precisely define how dance and drill played a particular role in socialization (especially when abstracted as a general theme in world history) when separated from the plethora of other factors at play. Nevertheless, it would seem that the "muscular bonding" that occurs during basic training certainly played some role in the relative psychological and social well-being of soldiers shipped overseas with their training cohort and those sent abroad as individual replacements.
On the whole, I probably wouldn't recommend this book to most readers, aside from some niche specialties among military historians and world historians . . . and, of course, fans of William H. McNeill.
March 19, 2021
This book is based on a fascinating premise, that when a group of people perform a set of physical actions, together and in time with each other, it builds social cohesion. Thus dance, military drill and group calisthenics have been and continue to be ways in which to forge a group consciousness and, just as important, reduce the importance of individual identity.
So far, so good. In fact, I'd reflected on the similarities between dance and drill back when I was a teenager, much to the discomfort of my air cadet NCO. The author provides an exhaustive (and exhausting) compendium of historical information to show how, arguably, this has always been the case. The key to the book's problems lie in the word “arguably” because ultimately the author is attempting to prove an unprovable thesis and to show unshowable connections. Consider this small selection of quotes from the book (believe me, there are many more):
p.95 “In general, it is safe to say that… it seems probable that… But it seems likely that…”
p.96 “one can only suspect that...”
p.107 “I suggest that… If so, this would indeed...”
P.115 “I am not about to address the question anew, wishing merely to ask...”
p.116 “...presumably...”
p.119 “...there is every reason to suppose...”
p.121 “We may accept enough… to believe that...”
p.152 “But in all probability...”
p.153 “It is plausible to suppose...”
The end result is a very dreary read. While I love the idea behind the book, its execution is painful: repetitive, dry and full of wishful thinking. There is interesting information to be had here, but you'll work to acquire it. Perhaps this should be considered a book to dip into rather than read (note my start and finish dates).
So far, so good. In fact, I'd reflected on the similarities between dance and drill back when I was a teenager, much to the discomfort of my air cadet NCO. The author provides an exhaustive (and exhausting) compendium of historical information to show how, arguably, this has always been the case. The key to the book's problems lie in the word “arguably” because ultimately the author is attempting to prove an unprovable thesis and to show unshowable connections. Consider this small selection of quotes from the book (believe me, there are many more):
p.95 “In general, it is safe to say that… it seems probable that… But it seems likely that…”
p.96 “one can only suspect that...”
p.107 “I suggest that… If so, this would indeed...”
P.115 “I am not about to address the question anew, wishing merely to ask...”
p.116 “...presumably...”
p.119 “...there is every reason to suppose...”
p.121 “We may accept enough… to believe that...”
p.152 “But in all probability...”
p.153 “It is plausible to suppose...”
The end result is a very dreary read. While I love the idea behind the book, its execution is painful: repetitive, dry and full of wishful thinking. There is interesting information to be had here, but you'll work to acquire it. Perhaps this should be considered a book to dip into rather than read (note my start and finish dates).
January 31, 2016
I was glad to track down a copy of this fascinating academic book through the American Council of Learning Societies print on demand service. This sliver of a book somehow manages to capture the importance of dance and drill through human history. McNeill draws on chimpanzee behaviour, dance in religious ceremonies, Greek phalanxes, Nazi Germany and Japanese callisthenics to support his thesis: 'Moving our muscles rhythmically and giving voice consolidate group solidarity by altering human feelings'. He calls this 'muscular bonding'.
Although this is an academic book, it is written in lively, limpid prose, as if McNeill is drawing his expressiveness from the activities he describes - things that are 'felt, not talked about'. His describes his own time in the army where during close order drill he experienced 'A strange sense of personal enlargement; a sort of swelling out, becoming bigger than life, thanks to participation in a collective ritual'.
It could be argued that this feeling of boundary loss, of 'I' becoming 'We' is the purpose of any ritual. But McNeill embeds the phenomena in the muscular and draws on studies showing the brain's physiological response to movement. He describes ancient oarsman rowing in pairs to the beat of the drum, keeping perfect time to avoid the danger that any modern rower will recognise: a 'deviation of more than a few inches, and missing by a fraction of a second, meant a tangle of oars and loss of momentum'. Keeping together in time is about more than just bonding - it's about keeping efficient and staying safe.
Although this is an academic book, it is written in lively, limpid prose, as if McNeill is drawing his expressiveness from the activities he describes - things that are 'felt, not talked about'. His describes his own time in the army where during close order drill he experienced 'A strange sense of personal enlargement; a sort of swelling out, becoming bigger than life, thanks to participation in a collective ritual'.
It could be argued that this feeling of boundary loss, of 'I' becoming 'We' is the purpose of any ritual. But McNeill embeds the phenomena in the muscular and draws on studies showing the brain's physiological response to movement. He describes ancient oarsman rowing in pairs to the beat of the drum, keeping perfect time to avoid the danger that any modern rower will recognise: a 'deviation of more than a few inches, and missing by a fraction of a second, meant a tangle of oars and loss of momentum'. Keeping together in time is about more than just bonding - it's about keeping efficient and staying safe.
February 26, 2016
The idea is great and the thesis is interesting but such a sad fact that at least in the religious aspect he is mostly quoting quasi science or then adding up quotes and ideas from different times and places that just can't be generalized in this manner if one wants to be a "real" academic/reseacher. Further more, the fact that he starts of from evolutionary theory and never seems to move much further then that just makes the thesis even more lacking in credibility. It stays mostly speculative from the beginning to the end. As populistic/popular science it's a great and over all interesting overview, yet nothing I would base further research on.
Turn out his idea wasn't even that genius or even new - seems he has borrowed the whole plot from somebody else (that is only mentioned in a couple of footnotes!)
Turn out his idea wasn't even that genius or even new - seems he has borrowed the whole plot from somebody else (that is only mentioned in a couple of footnotes!)
December 10, 2013
A fun, thought-provoking book that sees profound significance in Maurice of Orange's early modern military drill manual, dances, and various other practices and artifacts involving synchronized or simultaneous movement by groups of people. As in virtually all books of such a broad scope and sweeping statements, it not difficult to find points with which to quarrel. But it nonetheless gives the reader plenty to think about.
December 21, 2021
In this is a relatively short book the author traces the history of drill and dance. He talks of ‘muscular bonding’, ‘emotional resonance’, and ‘visceral’ effects. The emphasis is naturally on military matters. There is mention of the emotional effects of keeping in step, but it would appear little in the way of scientific studies of the subject, which makes the whole somewhat disappointing.
Want to read
March 8, 2014I added this to my To Read list since both Brian Eno and Stewart Brand include McNeill in their Long Now lists. It's about the role of rhythmic coordinated movement (dance, drills) in human communities.
Read
September 24, 2017NL 2.0
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