Dancing at the Thresholds

Music, Trance, and Feeling in Algerian Diwan of Sidi Bilal

By: Tamara Dee Turner

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Hardcover | 12 May 2026

At a Glance

Hardcover
356 Pages

Dimensions(cm)
22.9 x 15.2 x 2.39

Hardcover

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Dancing at the Thresholds tells the story of a racialized community in Algeria that literally trance dances at the thresholds of consciousness. It also tells the story about how these communities negotiate and "dance" at thresholds of the sacred and profane, at the perceived clashes of Islam and animism or of sub-Saharan versus North African lifeworlds.

Drawing on extensive ethnographic fieldwork alongside archival sources, oral histories, and ritual analysis, author Tamara Dee Turner considers these dances through an affective, embodied lens to challenge mainstream assumptions of affect theory. The dance embodies centuries of traumatic histories haunting these communities: their ritual, dÄ«wÄn, coalesced over three centuries of the trans-Saharan slave trade. Embodying these tumultuous pasts, dÄ«wÄn rituals move painful feelings through the trancing body to the point of affective "ignition" and release. However, to accomplish this, ritual actors must cultivate specific atmospheres conducive to trance and transformation via a particular Algerian understanding of atmosphere called "hÄl."

A much-needed ethnographic approach to the living family lineages, practices, and intimate epistemologies of diwan, Dancing at the Thresholds is a story about the nature of healing and how wellness depends on the respect of wider, affective ecologies beyond both the individual and the human.

Industry Reviews

"I cannot overemphasize how vital a scholarly contribution this is. We are fortunate indeed that Turner was able and willing to do this research, which unfolded over 10 years - giving the work a temporal depth that is rare these days. Given her own positionality as a musician capable not only of interviewing diwan experts but also of playing with them, she is the only one able to give us this kind of deeply researched, 'experience-near' personal account. No one else will be able to do this." - Jane Goodman, author of Staging Cultural Encounters: Algerian Actors Tour the United States "This book outlines a wealth of scholarship on under-recognized communities across Algeria with attention to the nuances of geography, purpose, generation, belief, and economy. By bringing these together with attention to a frame of ecology, Turner writes a compelling story that challenges notions of how these pieces of personal and ritual experience interrelate." - Christopher Witulski, author of The Gnawa Lions: Authenticity and Opportunity in Moroccan Ritual Music

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