I critique a proposal by Trevor Whittock that meaning in dance can be understood as non-verbal metaphor. His explanation of metaphor as a "recategorization" of things in "unnusual and unexpected contexts" is consistent with better-known explanations of literary metaphor in terms of "category mistakes" or "oppositions." But I argue that Whittock mistakenly equates the ways in which we learn to do something with the ways in which we learn to categorize something. His principal example, George Balanchine's Apollo, can be understood better as representation or depiction. I then consider meaning from the perspective of dancer, audience, and other persons.
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Last updated: July 3, 1997