WHEN SEEING IS BELIEVING - THE CHANGING-ROLE OF VISUALITY IN A PHILIPPINE DANCE

This article explores the changing subjective and objective visual sig nificance of the sinulog dance of Cebu City, Philippines-a pre-Hispani c healing ritual adapted to the folk Catholic worship of the Santo Nin o, and recently transformed into a secular, ''cultural'' performance. In the new context, the objectifying visual aspects of the sinulog dev eloped predominant and autonomous relationships to other sensory exper iences of the dancing, in particular to kinesthetic experience. The de velopment of this purified ''visuality'' reveals both the impact of ch anging historical conditions on the construction of the self-in-moveme nt in the dancing, as well as the creative efforts of its practitioner s to continue to find meaning in the practice in the midst of changing sociocultural circumstances.