According to a recent suggestion made by Joseph Jordania, dance together with body painting and rhythmic music, was a tool used by the natural selection's forces in the early ages of mankind's development for putting human groups into a certain state of battle trance. He explains that it was a very particular alternative state of consciousness. By it, individual would lose their personal identity and acquire a new type of identity, a collective one. According to Jonathan Pieslak's researches, some contemporary military units have the habit of singing loud and dancing in order to get ready for the perilous combat mission they are about to embark on. Jordania says that dance's ability to induce this state of trance comes from the past of the human development and it also includes some sort of military drill which also relies on sharing rhythmical and monotonous group activity.
Dance has existed from the beginnings of time. Perhaps it even appeared before the very first tribes were formed, but most certainly dance grew in popularity with the development of tribal life. So dance has always been a part of people's lives, although they did sometimes perform more than the entertainment function. Dances just had to be based on themes such as death, birth, the revival of nature in springtime, marriage, the teenagers' growing up, hunting, winning a battle or war with one's neighbors. Dance was also used for worshiping gods, agriculture, sexuality, chasing away evil spirits or for prosperity bringing rituals.
