Conclusion

The conclusion offers a summary of the main argument of the book, namely, that through the analysis of three case studies, a relationship is found between perceptual properties, on one side, and the reviewers’ and my own experience on the other. This relationship, however, is not one of entailment where reactions can be predicted or some form of glossary can be produced. My experiences emerged from the perception of properties, but are not reducible to them, in the same way that my perception of properties is not reducible to the physical properties of the performance. Through the discussion of these insights, I argue that this experience can only be understood from a perspective of embodied affective cognition. The conclusion also proposes that the experience of watching dance can serve as an exemplar to explain and illustrate lived experience and the inextricable link between cognition, emotion, and embodiment, and that this has potential further implications that extend beyond dance, for example into self-knowledge and mental health.