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Lorna Mills and Sally McKay
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Merlin Donald, a cognitive neuroscientist with a background in philosophy, says:
"A mimetic act is basically a motor performance that reflects the perceived event structure of the world, and its motoric aspect makes its content a public, that is, a potentially cultural, expression."
Merlin Donald, “Imitation and Mimesis,” in Perspectives on Imitation, From Neuroscience to Social Science, Vol 2, Hurley, Susan and Chater, Nick eds. (Cambridge: MIT Press, 2005) p. 281
"Mimesis is the reduplication of an event for communicative purposes. Mimesis requires that the audience can be taken into account. It also demands taking a third-person perspective on the actor's own behaviour."
Merlin Donald, ibid., p. 286
"Mimesis is an analogue or holistic style of thought that is more basic to our uniquely human way of thinking than language or logic. Indeed, on present evidence language and logic evolved much later, from a mimetic platform. Mimesis is a foundation skill that arrived early in evolution, and defined the human style. The components of mimetic cognition are present to some degree in primates, but are vastly more developed in humans. this makes mimetic culture a logical, but radical, extension of the primate mind. It remains an important force in human affairs, and produces such typically human cognitive patterns as ritual, skill, gesture, tribal identification, personal style, and public spectacle. It explains our irresistable tendency to imitate one another and conform to patterns of group behaviour, especially group emotional expression. It sets the tone of human social life, and it is the ultimate driving force behind art, which might be viewed as the ultimate refinement of the mimetic mode."
Merlin Donald, "Art and Congitive Evolution," in The Artful Mind, Mark Turner, ed., (New York: Oxford University Press, 2006) p.15