Practice

Traditions are inherited practices, which mean two things: they are both transmitted and learnt. The learning occurs through imitation, following instructions, through stories and so on. Consequently, traditions ‘change’ (i.e. undergo modifications) even as they are being transmitted and learnt. This makes traditions flexible and adaptive. Human practices conserve, that is, we do not go around …

Some consider it to be a “superstitious practice”, the implication being that it is irrational to believe that dancing causes the rain to fall: no reasonable people on earth can buy the story that dancing actually causes rain to fall. I am not willing to buy it. However, it is a fact that in some cultures people do perform ‘rain dances’. However, to explain the ‘rain dance’ by attributing a …