The people of Alola have long known to honor the Tapus of their respective islands, for earning their blessings can offer a prosperous future, while their wrath is menacing enough to destroy civilization itself. But the Tapu are notoriously finicky pokemon, who can not be pleased simply by performing a particular ritual or adhering to a certain set of prohibitions; if pleasing them was so easy, Tapu Village would still be standing. Humans in Alola, therefore, have had to learn the desires of their gods. And it is quite fortunate for them that, even before they developed a priesthood, they could rely on the dances of the Oricorio.
After drinking the nectar of local flowers – the same nectar which sustains the Tapus themselves – Oricorio show the people their Revelation Dance. The dance takes different forms on different islands, and so do the Oricorio which perform them; Ula'Ula's dance is a Baile displayed with flames, while on Melemele Island Oricorio use pom-poms to express their visions with arcs of lightning. The Pa'u Oricorio of Akala dispense with any sort of display, instead using immense psychic powers to beam the directives straight into the mind of the listeners, and the Sensu Oricorio of Poni island use the spirits of the dead to act out a sort of play.
Pokemon can not speak human languages, and even dance has its limitations as a form of communication, so the messages of the Oricorio have often been misunderstood. Whole villages have carried out acts of sacrilege and been struck down by the Tapus, or destroyed themselves in civil wars over how to interpret an Oricorio's message. But even in this urbanized age, each island carefully maintains its Oricorio meadow, for a misunderstood Oricorio is far less dangerous than no pokemon to provide oracles at all.