Supervisors info:
Μπουρνέλλη Π., Επίκουρη Καθηγήτρια, ΤΕΦΑΑ, ΕΚΠΑ,
Γογγάκη, Κ., Επίκουρη Καθηγήτρια, ΤΕΦΑΑ, ΕΚΠΑ,
Μπαρμπούση Α., Αναπληρώτρια Καθηγήτρια, Τμήμα Θεατρικών Σπουδών, Πανεπιστήμιο Πελοποννήσου
Summary:
The dance training, based on the Cartesian dualistic model’s frame, traditionally depends on techniques approaching the body as an object, breaking it into fragments, with main goal to further develop the dancers’ physical skills. Since the beginning of the 20th century however, new theories, strongly challenging the Cartesian dualism, have been reuniting body and mind, paving new paths to both a phenomenological as well as an existential approach to dance. This theoretical turn has led to establishing the modern trends for movement approach and to challenging the dancing as an art itself by introducing new analytical implements. The phenomenological example of embodiment, by counterbalancing the semiotic paradigm of culture as text, is the quintessence of the somatics. These practices, like the Feldenkrais technique, the Alexander technique, the Body Mind Centering etc, approach the body as a unity, featuring dynamics and leading participators to experience an integral and continuously changeable body, unpredictable and open to experience. Shifting the focus from structure to action results in the body and its movement coming from a continuous flow. The flow here is not regarded as a constituent element of the movement, but rather as a state wherein the dancer is completely connected with the action. Given that dancing can promote social meanings and special personal experiences only if the dancer is presumed an active subject, this research aims to: a) spotlight the philosophical aspect of somatics and b) study their efficiency as regards the dancers’ movement quality and flow experience. Insofar as our modern age needs experiential, emancipated bodies, the value of the study lies in the very proof of the somatics’ efficiency, so as to promote the rethinking of the dance-training status quo and to shift the attention onto experiential, embodied knowledge.The methodological procedure used for realizing this aim was the bibliographic review. Through the critical presentation of relative bibliography, the emphasis was put on the concepts of the embodiment theory, the experience of flow and the quality of movement, in combination with the practices leading to this connection. The review has been structured into chapters on: the conceptual approach to dance, from theory to dance training, the flow theory, the embodiment theory, as well as the somatics and their implementation on dancing. Critical analysis spotlighted so much the philosophical principles derived from somatics, as their importance. In coclusion, somatics can promote the dancers’ quality and potency of movement, while leading them into the flow experience, since they approach movement as an inextricable, undivided part of the human existence, experienced as a continuously changing, unique and utterly personal experience. This experience is being put down on record and can be used as a source of new knowledge, conducing to the reeducation of the body, improving its functionality and delivering it from previous moving patterns, enabling dancers to experience the delicate qualities and nuances of movement. Somatics approach the body holistically, without detaching it from its integrate being, while utilizing the information received by the subjective, phenomenological body. Through their two essential functions, namely consciousness and awareness, somatics lead to concentration and control, fundamental requisites for the experience of flow. The experience of flow, as a state in dance, meets the Csikszentmichalyi theory (1972), which in turn provides the theoretical background to define this state as a primacy if dancing is to have meaning. This approach takes dance training a step forward, from the effort and the technique of well-trained legs to the state of the embodied, changeable and unforeseen “thinking body”, by focusing on the dancer’s utter involvement in the momentum, on the -free of body abuse- functionality of movement, i.e. on the very experience of the flow.
Keywords:
embodiment, phenomenology of dance, dance training, enhancing the dance technique, the Feldenkrais technique and dance, the release techniques
