Embodied Orality: Transmission in Traditional Japanese Music

Abstract

Although the debate of orality versus literacy began with Plato, can we say that this debate has come to its rightful conclusion? There is still a lot to understand about orality in the transmission of music when we consider that an important aspect of it has clearly not been studied extensively: embodiment. Can there be a knowledge transmitted through the body that makes writing and verbalization play a peripheral role? The acting, moving, learning, feeling, and knowledgeable body plays a crucial role well beyond what is being transmitted. A large part of that knowledge cannot be put into words, but it is imparted when musicians or dancers perform onstage. In this article, we take a close look at the importance of embodied learning in traditional Japanese oral transmission.

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