ABSTRACT
Being human involve imitation of those around us, along with their imitation of us, and throughout our lives overt and covert imitation remains basic to communication and our understanding of one another. This chapter shows how instrumental music engages us, and what its affective results and functions in Buffy are. The key element in our account is the principle of mimetic participation. The acts of imitation result in actual or imagined participation, we can refer to this aspect of human cognition as mimetic participation. The basic theory of mimetic participation is that when we see and/or hear someone else doing something, part of how we understand their actions involves imagining doing the same thing ourselves. Four details of the theory are that: mitation can be actual or imaginary; it can occur in real-time or in reflection; it can be conscious or unconscious; and the strength of imitation will vary from person to person.
