Through dance, people meet demons, ward off death, shake off sin and evil, come to terms with life crises, mediate paradoxes, resolve conflict, revitalize the past to re-create the present, enhance their self-concept and body image, attract attention, assert themselves, confront the strong, and persuade others to change their ways.

Contrary to conventional wisdom, dance is not a universal 'language' but many languages and dialects. There are close to 6000 verbal languages, and probably that many dance languages.

Through dance, people meet demons, ward off death, shake off sin and evil, come to terms with life crises, mediate paradoxes, resolve conflict, revitalize the past to re-create the present, enhance their self-concept and body image, attract attention, assert themselves, confront the strong, and persuade others to change their ways.

It is the persistence of dance in helping people to resist, reduce, and escape stress since early humanity that attests to its efficacy.

He [Wilhelm Reich] believed that the individual's walk, stance, and breath patterns revealed a specific character type. Reich thought chronic muscular tension indicated repression and blocked the expression of affect. An example is the tight holding of the chest area as a sign of repressed feelings of need and longing.

Danced healing rituals (in African village compounds, temple courtyards, dance-therapy studios, public theaters, and other social settings) reinvoke old traumas for exorcism and the transformation of fear, convince people that evil is gone or possible to dissipate, and reaffirm communal solidarity and a sense of well-being.

In contrast to what the women have been told (that they are dumb and ugly) and how they have been controlled with confined strictures, the dance class is a safe place in which the women have choices and can improve their self-concept.