Ballet Body Narratives: Pain, Pleasure And Perfection In Embodied
Identity

Product Description

Ballet Body Narratives is an ethnographic exploration of the social world of classical ballet & the embodiment of young ballet dancers as they engage in "becoming a dancer" in ballet school in England In contrast to the largely disembodied sociological literature of the body this book places the corporeal body as central to the examination & reveals significant relationships between body society & identity Drawing on academic scholarship as well as rich ballet body narratives from young dancers this book investigates how young ballet dancers' bodies are lived experienced & constructed through their desire to become performing ballet dancers as well as the seductive appeal of the ballet aesthetic Pierre Bourdieu's critique of the perpetuating social order & his theoretical framework of field habitus & capital are applied as a way of understanding the social world of ballet but also of relating the ballet habitus & belief in the body to broader social structures This book examines the distinctiveness of ballet culture & aspects of young ballet dancers' embodied identity through a central focus on the ballet body