Neo-Spiritual Aesthetics

Tracing embodied transformation in the context of the neo-spiritual Israeli dance improvisation practice Gaga, this book demystifies what the author coins as the "Gaga effect" - the embodied effect of Gaga on its participants. Lina Aschenbrenner takes the reader on an analytical journey through a Gaga class, outlining the effective aesthetics of environment and movement. She distinguishes a threefold effect of Gaga practice - from a momentary extraordinary experience, to a lasting therapeutic effect, and finally Gaga's worldview potential. The book shows why seemingly leisure time activities such as Gaga form indeed justified and fruitful research objects to an academic study-of-religion and opens up research on neo-spiritual practices. In understanding the sensory effect of practice and its cultural and social implications, the book follows an Aesthetics of Religion approach, departing from the idea that cognition is embodied and that the body is thus central to understanding cultural and social phenomena. Drawing upon a wide array of data gathered in the context of Gaga at the Suzanne Dellal Center in Tel Aviv, this book weaves together different methods of ritual, movement, discourse, and narrative analysis, while acknowledging insights from neuroscience and cognitive science.