Contemporary dance Books

Book SynopsisThis study focuses on dance as an activist practice in and of itself, across geographical locations and over the course of a century, from 1920 to 2020. Through doing so, it considers how dance has been an empowering agent for political action throughout civilisation. Dance and Activism offers a glimpse of different strategies of mobilizing the human body for good and justice for all, and captures the increasing political activism epitomized by bodies moving on the streets in some of the most turbulent political situations. This has, most recently, undoubtedly been partly owing to the rise of the far-right internationally, which has marked an increase in direct action on the streets.Offering a survey of key events across the century, such as the fall of President Zuma in South Africa; pro-reproductive rights action in Poland and Argentina; and the recent women''s marches against Donald Trump''s presidency, you will see how dance has become an urgent field of sTrade ReviewMills artfully weaves together a massive array of case studies, drawing connections across the globe and throughout the century. * Dance International *Mills brings an investigative style and ethnographic approach to dig deep—within contextual layers and personal stories—to discover an interpretation that positions the dialog between the social cultural moment, the dancer, and the dance … A tightly and provocatively argued book that provides a new perspective on dance as activism. * Journal of Dance Education *Dance and Activism: A Century of Radical Dance Across the World, makes an important contribution to ongoing conversations within the field of dance studies about the political nature of dance. The book explores the mobilization of dance as a language and method for activism and radical hope, extending and refining the intimate relationship between dance and politics outlined in Mills’s previous work. * Dance Chronicle *Dance and Activism’s main strength is that it is something of a pioneer ... Dance and Activism is a welcome and necessary addition to the dance history and dance studies canon. Graduate program directors would be wise to point students toward this book not only as a resource, but as a reminder that powerful and transformative dance exists outside the concert stage. * Theatre Topics *A most intriguing, erudite book. * Sydney Arts Guide *Mills’s book provides unique case studies that draw from different forms of dance across the globe. These case studies analyse the actions of the dancers and choreographers, not choreographed works. The majority of books about dance and politics rely on analysis of dance pieces or theorize from generalized notions of dance. Mills also focuses on the actions of the dancers and choreographers whose actions are explicitly political/create direct action in the world. The site of their action is the world at large, not the theatre for a select audience. The majority of books about dance and politics discuss the political effects of events that occur in the closed environment of the theatre or dance studio. * Leah Cox, Dean of the American Dance Festival *Mills shows how dance and dancers from the stage to the streets have responded to forces of alienation and oppression, and how they have moved their bodies—and others—to imagine different worlds. It is a stirring and powerful read, and a prelude to action. * Glory Liu, Harvard University, USA *The past is constantly present as Dana Mills chronicles the extraordinary potential our expressive dancing body/mind. In an age of increasingly sedentary work, her deep analysis of “dance as activism” lays bare a far-reaching radicalism and breadth of diversity in dance forms. Dance and Activism is both timely and necessary. * Blakeley White-McGuire, Dancer, Choreographer, Educator and Activist, USA *In this groundbreaking multi-disciplinary book, Dana Mills leads dance from the wings of political activism to the centre stage of human resistance and the creative struggle for freedom and our most precious, primordial material possession – the bodies in which we live and struggle for self-possession. Mills deftly choreographs a century of global theatre of street protest and popular movements through the individual stories and collective moments and movements that create surprising uprisings and new solidarities. A brilliant political theorist, activist and dancer at the forefront of the pursuit of a new dialectics for our troubled modern age, Mills shares her cogent analysis and innovative thinking in a readable, engaging form that leaps beyond intellectual boundaries and galvanises a new genre of thought in action. Vividly describing how our restless bodies can and will reach out, rise up and protect everything that is human and beautiful in our world, Dana Mills shows, with passion and commitment, why people will never stop dancing in search of freedom. * Rachel Holmes is critically acclaimed author of, most recently, Eleanor Marx: a Life and Sylvia Pankhurst: Natural Born Rebel *This book is essential for anyone who wants dance to be part of their revolution. * New Books Network *Table of ContentsPreface and Acknowledgments If we can't dance, we don't want to be part of your revolution Alienation solidarity Method Prelude to action Martha Graham: Embodied Chronicle 2. ‘Go ahead and be a bastard’ Anna Sokolow Through dance I have experienced the wordless joy of freedom: Pearl Primus Dance as intervention, dance as action Ballet beyond borders ‘No one is born hating another person because of the color of his skin’ ‘Going around the house like a butterfly’ Ballet, home, Syria The canon must be fired! Ballet and the long arc of history There is only now: radical ballet going forward Erbil/ New York City: Break/ Dance The body in battle Those who leave and those who stay Not just for you, but for the rest of the earth Ballade of belonging At the still point of the turning world Break/ dance: echoing further: Erbil Steps in the street: Revolution DJ Dance on the march The People (dancing) united can never be defeated Dancing onwards! Dance as a home Transitions Home, exile, words, movement Arriving Storytelling Unraveling Homelessness- Devastation- Exile Spectre, haunting Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisA reclamation and interpretation of a once-dismissed aspect of American film historyEarly hip hop film musicals have either been expunged from cinema history or excoriated in brief passages by critics and other writers. Hip Hop on Film reclaims and reexamines productions such as Breakin'' (1984), Beat Street (1984), and Krush Groove (1985) in order to illuminate Hollywood''s fascinating efforts to incorporate this nascent urban culture into conventional narrative forms. Such films presented musical conventions against the backdrop of graffiti-splattered trains and abandoned tenements in urban communities of color, setting the stage for radical social and political transformations. Hip hop musicals are also part of the broader history of teen cinema, and films such as Charlie Ahearn''s Wild Style (1983) are here examined alongside other contemporary youth-oriented productions. As suburban teen films banished parents and children to the margins of narrative action, hip hop musicals, by c

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Book SynopsisThe untold story of how breaking one of the most widely practiced dance forms in the world today began as a distinctly African American expression in the Bronx, New York, during the 1970s. Breaking is the first and most widely practiced hip-hop dance in the world, with around one million participants in this dynamic, multifaceted artform and, as of 2024, Olympic sport. Yet, despite its global reach and nearly 50-year history, stories of breaking's origins have largely neglected the African Americans who founded it. Dancer and scholar Serouj Midus Aprahamian offers, for the first time, a detailed look into the African American beginnings of breaking in the Bronx, New York. The Birth of Breaking challenges numerous myths and misconceptions that have permeated studies of hip-hop's evolution, considering the influence breaking has had on hip-hop culture. Including previously unseen archival material, interviews, and detailed depictions of the dance at its outset, this boTrade ReviewThe Birth of Breaking is the most complete and in-depth study of the origins of hip-hop to date. Midus's research is unmatched and he sets the bar high for all future scholarship. Praise True. * Pete Nice, Co-Curator, Universal Hip Hop Museum *The Birth of Breaking offers an insightful and vitally important account of hip-hop history, presenting it in a way that properly acknowledges the crucial contributions of African-Americans and their cultural traditions, highlights the central role of women, and underlines the importance of breaking in hip-hop's development. This book is a must-read for anyone who is interested in or involved in hip-hop culture. * Rachael “Raygun” Gunn, 2020 and 2021 Top Ranked b-girl by the Australian Breaking Association, and Lecturer in Media and Creative Industries, Macquarie University, Australia *A tour de force study of the African American wellsprings of breaking, written with academic rigor and empathetic care. With outstanding complexity, Serouj Midus Aprahamian explains how race and class have shaped hip-hop dance histories. Exploring unpublished archives and conducting new interviews with hip-hop legends from the 1970s, The Birth of Breaking demonstrates how dance has been central to understanding hip-hop’s powerful global influence. * Thomas F, DeFrantz, Professor of Performance Studies, Northwestern University, USA *As a b-boy and scholar, Dr. Aprahamian could not be better positioned to author this groundbreaking historical study that sets the record straight on the genesis of breaking culture. A combination of archival research, practitioner interviews, and embodied knowledge, The Birth of Breaking details how innovations in this Black vernacular dance influenced the advent of hip-hop music, dispels myths that link the dance to Black criminality, and recognizes the contribution of women to this vibrant dance culture. * Sherril Dodds, Professor of Dance, Temple University, USA *Table of ContentsList of Illustrations Acknowledgments 1. Detecting Breaking’s Beginnings 2. Going Off in the Bronx 3. Keeping the Movement Moving 4. Make Way for the B-Boys 5. Mothers of the Movement 6. Breaking’s Latino Adoption Epilogue: Back to the Beginning Notes Index

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Book SynopsisA new exploration of how digital media assert the relevance of dance in a wired world How has the Internet changed dance? Dance performances can now be seen anywhere, can be looped endlessly at user whim, and can integrate crowds in unprecedented ways. Dance practices are evolving to explore these new possibilities. In Perpetual Motion, Harmony Bench argues that dance is a vital part of civil society and a means for building participation and community. She looks at how, after 9/11, it became a crucial way of recuperating the common character of public spaces. She explores how crowdsourcing dance contributes to the project of performing a common world, as well as the social relationships forged when we look at dance as a gift in the era of globalization. Throughout, she asks how dance brings people together in digital spaces and what dance’s digital travels might mean for how we experience and express community. From original research on dance today to political economies of digital media to the philosophy of dance, Perpetual Motion provides an ambitious, invigorating look at a commonly shared practice.Trade Review"In Perpetual Motion, Harmony Bench achieves a stunning tour de force rendering of dance created for internet distribution. Reading the digitized bodies-in-motion as the basis for a twenty-first century common, she constructs essential theoretical models for considering asymmetrical access to dance, travel, the technologies of digital production, and modes of global distribution. A crucial offering for dance studies."—Thomas F. DeFrantz, former president, Society of Dance History Scholars"How does dance move through digital cultures and how do digital cultures move through dance? Perpetual Motion explores acts of transfer among and across on-screen and off-screen bodies that manifest as dance. A highly skilled dance scholar and a precise and accessible writer, Harmony Bench reads embodied, screenal entanglements as a matter of performative commoning and offers both historical perspective and immediate experience of mediatic, danced, choreographic, and spectatorial encounters."—Rebecca Schneider, Brown University"With an unmatched skill at plain-language engagement with dense philosophical problems, Bench lays out a wide-ranging case for the radical possibilities inherent in the online dissemination of even the corniest dances, while avoiding neoliberal language of democratization and universality."—Performance Research "This book is a rewarding way to further study dance in the digital age, with deep considerations of access and distribution, and explorations of what technology means for audience engagement, collaboration and more."—Dance TeacherTable of ContentsContentsAcknowledgmentsIntroduction: Dance as Common1. Interactivity and Agency: Making-Common and the Limits of Difference2. Dance in Public: Of Common Spaces3. A World from a Crowd: Composing the Common 4. Screen Sharing: Dance as Gift of the CommonNotesIndex

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Book SynopsisA new exploration of how digital media assert the relevance of dance in a wired world How has the Internet changed dance? Dance performances can now be seen anywhere, can be looped endlessly at user whim, and can integrate crowds in unprecedented ways. Dance practices are evolving to explore these new possibilities. In Perpetual Motion, Harmony Bench argues that dance is a vital part of civil society and a means for building participation and community. She looks at how, after 9/11, it became a crucial way of recuperating the common character of public spaces. She explores how crowdsourcing dance contributes to the project of performing a common world, as well as the social relationships forged when we look at dance as a gift in the era of globalization. Throughout, she asks how dance brings people together in digital spaces and what dance’s digital travels might mean for how we experience and express community. From original research on dance today to political economies of digital media to the philosophy of dance, Perpetual Motion provides an ambitious, invigorating look at a commonly shared practice.Trade Review"In Perpetual Motion, Harmony Bench achieves a stunning tour de force rendering of dance created for internet distribution. Reading the digitized bodies-in-motion as the basis for a twenty-first century common, she constructs essential theoretical models for considering asymmetrical access to dance, travel, the technologies of digital production, and modes of global distribution. A crucial offering for dance studies."—Thomas F. DeFrantz, former president, Society of Dance History Scholars"How does dance move through digital cultures and how do digital cultures move through dance? Perpetual Motion explores acts of transfer among and across on-screen and off-screen bodies that manifest as dance. A highly skilled dance scholar and a precise and accessible writer, Harmony Bench reads embodied, screenal entanglements as a matter of performative commoning and offers both historical perspective and immediate experience of mediatic, danced, choreographic, and spectatorial encounters."—Rebecca Schneider, Brown University"With an unmatched skill at plain-language engagement with dense philosophical problems, Bench lays out a wide-ranging case for the radical possibilities inherent in the online dissemination of even the corniest dances, while avoiding neoliberal language of democratization and universality."—Performance Research "This book is a rewarding way to further study dance in the digital age, with deep considerations of access and distribution, and explorations of what technology means for audience engagement, collaboration and more."—Dance TeacherTable of ContentsContentsAcknowledgmentsIntroduction: Dance as Common1. Interactivity and Agency: Making-Common and the Limits of Difference2. Dance in Public: Of Common Spaces3. A World from a Crowd: Composing the Common 4. Screen Sharing: Dance as Gift of the CommonNotesIndex

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Book SynopsisThe vital role of dance in enacting the embodied experiences of Indigenous peoples In Dancing Indigenous Worlds, Jacqueline Shea Murphy brings contemporary Indigenous dance makers into the spotlight, putting critical dance studies and Indigenous studies in conversation with one another in fresh and exciting new ways. Exploring Indigenous dance from North America and Aotearoa (New Zealand), she shows how dance artists communicate Indigenous ways of being, as well as generate a political force, engaging Indigenous understandings and histories.Following specific dance works over time, Shea Murphy interweaves analysis, personal narrative, and written contributions from multiple dance artists, demonstrating dance’s crucial work in asserting and enacting Indigenous worldviews and the embodied experiences of Indigenous peoples. As Shea Murphy asserts, these dance-making practices can not only disrupt the structures that European colonization feeds upon and strives to maintain, but they can also recalibrate contemporary dance. Based on more than twenty years of relationship building and research, Shea Murphy’s work contributes to growing, and largely underreported, discourses on decolonizing dance studies, and the geopolitical, gendered, racial, and relational meanings that dance theorizes and negotiates. She also includes discussions about the ethics of writing about Indigenous knowledge and peoples as a non-Indigenous scholar, and models approaches for doing so within structures of ongoing reciprocal, respectful, responsible action.Trade Review "This remarkable text effectively establishes Indigenous dance studies as a vibrant time-based field of inquiry. Crafting theoretical models in direct relationship to repeated practices of witnessing and experiencing, Jacqueline Shea Murphy models a rich future for scholarship as a shared encounter among stakeholders to performance. Urgent, important, and written to endure as a document of continued creativity, Dancing Indigenous Worlds confirms the intellectual possibilities of translating gesture to text and of moving with care."—Thomas F. DeFrantz, Northwestern University "In Dancing Indigenous Worlds, Jacqueline Shea Murphy performs a deeply ethical, deliberate ‘witnessing’ of Indigenous dance making. In these stories of how to create radical relationality between bodies, land, history, food—and milk as more than food—the reader should be aware they are being readied; a space has been prepared, the invocations have been made, contemporary movements connected to dance genealogies, past brutalities cast in the surrounding shadows, the spotlight is on bright, and you must step into this world that has been danced for you. There is room for all, and everything, as Shea Murphy reminds us, begins with respect."—Michelle Erai, author of Girl of New Zealand: Colonial Optics in Aotearoa "The widely varied contexts within Dancing Indigenous Worlds demonstrates the vibrancy of current respectful, relational, Indigenous choreographies."—CHOICE Table of Contents Contents Preface Introduction Choreographing Relationality Modern Dance and Modernity/Coloniality Recalibrations of Relational Exchange Intersections of Dance and Indigenous Studies 1. Choreographies of Relational Reciprocity Hosts and Visitors, Aotearoa, 2009 Manaakitanga in Motion: Choreographies of Possibility With Jack Gray Hashtag Mitimiti: Where You At? With Andrew Kendall, Diane Kendall, Tia Reihana-Morunga, Deborah Cocker, and Toni Temehana Pasion 2. Choreographies of Perspectival Relationality Dance Workshop, Riverside, California, 2006 With Rulan Tangen Expansive Relationality/Of Bodies of Elements Identities and Accountabilities, 2019 With Rulan Tangen Interlude/Pause/Provocation Refuge Rock: Otonabee River, Ontario, 2010 With Tanya Lukin Linklater 3. Choreographies of Relational Abun-dance Precarity Abundance and Abun-dance Emily Johnson/Catalyst 4. Choreographies of Relational Refusings Yirramboi, Melbourne, Australia, 2017 Facing Refusal Teachings in Listening Indigenous Dance Works/Indigenous Dance Making/Indigenous Writing With Rosy Simas, Mishuana Goeman, Tanya Lukin Linklater, and Daystar/Rosalie Jones Conclusion: Closing and Opening Acknowledgments Notes Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisThe vital role of dance in enacting the embodied experiences of Indigenous peoples In Dancing Indigenous Worlds, Jacqueline Shea Murphy brings contemporary Indigenous dance makers into the spotlight, putting critical dance studies and Indigenous studies in conversation with one another in fresh and exciting new ways. Exploring Indigenous dance from North America and Aotearoa (New Zealand), she shows how dance artists communicate Indigenous ways of being, as well as generate a political force, engaging Indigenous understandings and histories.Following specific dance works over time, Shea Murphy interweaves analysis, personal narrative, and written contributions from multiple dance artists, demonstrating dance’s crucial work in asserting and enacting Indigenous worldviews and the embodied experiences of Indigenous peoples. As Shea Murphy asserts, these dance-making practices can not only disrupt the structures that European colonization feeds upon and strives to maintain, but they can also recalibrate contemporary dance. Based on more than twenty years of relationship building and research, Shea Murphy’s work contributes to growing, and largely underreported, discourses on decolonizing dance studies, and the geopolitical, gendered, racial, and relational meanings that dance theorizes and negotiates. She also includes discussions about the ethics of writing about Indigenous knowledge and peoples as a non-Indigenous scholar, and models approaches for doing so within structures of ongoing reciprocal, respectful, responsible action.Trade Review "This remarkable text effectively establishes Indigenous dance studies as a vibrant time-based field of inquiry. Crafting theoretical models in direct relationship to repeated practices of witnessing and experiencing, Jacqueline Shea Murphy models a rich future for scholarship as a shared encounter among stakeholders to performance. Urgent, important, and written to endure as a document of continued creativity, Dancing Indigenous Worlds confirms the intellectual possibilities of translating gesture to text and of moving with care."—Thomas F. DeFrantz, Northwestern University "In Dancing Indigenous Worlds, Jacqueline Shea Murphy performs a deeply ethical, deliberate ‘witnessing’ of Indigenous dance making. In these stories of how to create radical relationality between bodies, land, history, food—and milk as more than food—the reader should be aware they are being readied; a space has been prepared, the invocations have been made, contemporary movements connected to dance genealogies, past brutalities cast in the surrounding shadows, the spotlight is on bright, and you must step into this world that has been danced for you. There is room for all, and everything, as Shea Murphy reminds us, begins with respect."—Michelle Erai, author of Girl of New Zealand: Colonial Optics in Aotearoa "The widely varied contexts within Dancing Indigenous Worlds demonstrates the vibrancy of current respectful, relational, Indigenous choreographies."—CHOICE Table of Contents Contents Preface Introduction Choreographing Relationality Modern Dance and Modernity/Coloniality Recalibrations of Relational Exchange Intersections of Dance and Indigenous Studies 1. Choreographies of Relational Reciprocity Hosts and Visitors, Aotearoa, 2009 Manaakitanga in Motion: Choreographies of Possibility With Jack Gray Hashtag Mitimiti: Where You At? With Andrew Kendall, Diane Kendall, Tia Reihana-Morunga, Deborah Cocker, and Toni Temehana Pasion 2. Choreographies of Perspectival Relationality Dance Workshop, Riverside, California, 2006 With Rulan Tangen Expansive Relationality/Of Bodies of Elements Identities and Accountabilities, 2019 With Rulan Tangen Interlude/Pause/Provocation Refuge Rock: Otonabee River, Ontario, 2010 With Tanya Lukin Linklater 3. Choreographies of Relational Abun-dance Precarity Abundance and Abun-dance Emily Johnson/Catalyst 4. Choreographies of Relational Refusings Yirramboi, Melbourne, Australia, 2017 Facing Refusal Teachings in Listening Indigenous Dance Works/Indigenous Dance Making/Indigenous Writing With Rosy Simas, Mishuana Goeman, Tanya Lukin Linklater, and Daystar/Rosalie Jones Conclusion: Closing and Opening Acknowledgments Notes Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisEarly hip hop film musicals have either been expunged from cinema history or excoriated in brief passages by critics and other writers. Hip Hop on Film reclaims and reexamines productions such as Breakin' (1984), Beat Street (1984), and Krush Groove (1985) in order to illuminate Hollywood's fascinating efforts to incorporate this nascent urban culture into conventional narrative forms. Such films presented musical conventions against the backdrop of graffiti-splattered trains and abandoned tenements in urban communities of color, setting the stage for radical social and political transformations. Hip hop musicals are also part of the broader history of teen cinema, and films such as Charlie Ahearn's Wild Style (1983) are here examined alongside other contemporary youth-oriented productions. As suburban teen films banished parents and children to the margins of narrative action, hip hop musicals, by contrast, presented inclusive and unconventional filial groupings that included all members of the neighborhood. These alternative social configurations directly referenced specific urban social problems, which affected the stability of inner city families following diminished governmental assistance in communities of color during the 1980s.Breakdancing, a central element of hip hop musicals, is also reconsidered. It gained widespread acclaim at the same time that these films entered the theaters, but the nation's newly discovered dance form was embattled--caught between a multitude of institutional entities such as the ballet academy, advertising culture, and dance publications that vied to control its meaning, particularly in relation to delineations of gender. As street-trained breakers were enticed to join the world of professional ballet, this newly forged relationship was recast by dance promoters as a way to invigorate and ""remasculinize"" European dance, while young women simultaneously critiqued conventional masculinities through an appropriation of breakdance. These multiple and volatile histories influenced the first wave of hip hop films, and even structured the sleeper hit Flashdance (1983). This forgotten, ignored, and maligned cinema is not only an important aspect of hip hop history, but is also central to the histories of teen film, the postclassical musical, and even institutional dance. Kimberley Monteyne places these films within the wider context of their cultural antecedents and reconsiders the genre's influence.

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Book SynopsisEurythmy is an art form that makes sounds visible. By incorporating zodiac gestures into their art, as indicated by Rudolf Steiner, eurythmists can draw on a deep connection between the earth and the cosmos.The zodiac, as representative of the whole cosmos, is a vital part of human spirituality, acting as the backdrop to human life. But it can be hard to fathom the zodiac's secrets, even through meditation. Barfod draws a parallel between meditative exercises and eurythmy practice, and shows how zodiac gestures in eurythmy can reveal cosmic insights.This is a book for eurythmy teachers and practitioners who want to deepen their art and spiritual work.Trade Review'An absolute treasure-trove of information on the Zodiac... I would thoroughly recommend this book to anyone and consider it an absolute must-have for any eurythmist.'-- Saraphir Qaa-Rishi, EurythmistTable of ContentsForeword by Virginia Sease PrefaceOut of the Creative Chaos 1. The Zodiac in Eurythmy The cosmic human being in the zodiac The gestures of the day and night colours The origin of the archetypal colour gestures The artistic elements and the colour zodiac gestures Archetypal straight line and spiral tendencies in the zodiac Forming the zodiac gestures out of colour, the part of the body and the spiral or linear force The eurythmic characteristics of the zodiac 2. The Consonants in the Zodiac The consonants as an echo of the cosmic formative forces The six single and the six double sounds The essence of the sound as a complete entity Aries and the sound V Taurus and the sound R Gemini and the sound H Cancer and the sound F Leo and the sound T Virgo and sounds B and P Libra and the sounds C (Ts) and Ch Scorpio and the sound S Sagittarius and the sounds G and K Capricorn and the sound L Aquarius and the sound M Pisces and the sound N 3. The Composition of the Totality of the Zodiac The three crosses of the zodiac The six axes and their polarities The trines of the four elements in the zodiac The post-Atlantean sequence of cultural epochs The threefold human being within the zodiac 4. Forces of Order in the Sounds of the Zodiac The sequence of consonants The evolutionary sequence in the zodiac The eurythmy figures The spatial experience of form in the sounds of speech 5. Rudolf Steiner’s Twelve Moods The twelve zodiac verses The three verbal moods Special features of a eurythmy performance The sequence of planets within the zodiac verse 6. The Zodiac as the Source of All Created Things Insights into the zodiac given by Rudolf Steiner The effects of the zodiac on the forming of human beings The twelve senses in the zodiac 7. Work-Based Movement and Sound in the Zodiac Introduction to the next three chapters Traditional work-based movements and sounds Work and movement – music and speech The human being in movement and eurythmy Human work in relation to the course of the year 8. The Zodiac and Technology Twelve styles of technology The one-sidedness of the zodiac animals as formative forces 9. Conversational Gestures and the Zodiac The six speech gestures Conversational gestures as an imitation of the speech gestures The conversational gestures in the zodiac The speech gestures and the colours Dynamic variety in connection with the speech gestures Overview and concluding remarks 10. The Connection of Artistic Practice and Training Introduction Meditation exercises and the zodiac in eurythmy The path of knowledge and the zodiac in eurythmy The shaping of gestures and the path of practice 11. Artistic Elements in Eurythmy and Their Twelve Metamorphoses 12. The Task of the Earthly and the Cosmic Human Being Wonder, empathy and conscience and the meditations IAO and TAO Notes Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisRudolf Steiner initiated a new art of movement, which can be characterised as speech and music made visible. This concise but informative guide to eurythmy includes a brief survey of dance, from its origin in the ancient mysteries to its contemporary forms, placing Steiner's ideas in their historical context.It then goes on to explore the three main strands of eurythmy: as stage performance, in education, and in therapy, giving insightful examples of each.The book has been revised and updated, and includes black and white photographs of performance and educational eurythmy.

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Book SynopsisCelebrated eurythmist Werner Barfod details the seven planetary gestures in eurythmy and outlines how each expresses a different relationship of the human being to the world. Eurythmy is an art form that makes sounds visible through movement. As well as gestures for speech and music, eurythmy also incorporates gestures that relate to the stars and the planets, as indicated by Rudolf Steiner.In this fascinating book, a companion volume to The Zodiac Gestures in Eurythmy, Werner Barfod describes the seven planetary gestures and how each one expresses a different relationship of the human being to the world. He explains how the planetary forces work in different people, and the meditative development and ways of working that eurythmists need to cultivate to bring creativity into their art.This book will appeal to eurythmy teachers and practitioners who want to deepen their art and spiritual work.

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Book SynopsisInclusive Dance is an ethnography of disability arts, and historiographic overview of the 1980s when many new disability arts groups came to fruition. Touchdown Dance was the research 'ambition' of dancer Steve Paxton and theatre maker and psychotherapist Anne Kilcoyne, involving visually impaired and sighted adults in Contact Improvisation - a dyadic movement form requiring physical contact. Katy Dymoke took over Touchdown Dance in 1994 and refers here to archives, accounts and personal experience to share the learning that has been shared over the years to today. Touch and movement are vital for accessibility and inclusion and modality specific approaches were devised to ensure a democratic process towards the inclusion of visually impaired people in a pro-touch activity. The continuum of movement based methods fills the gaps in polarities of visual and nonvisual and a two-way membrane interlinks all the participants in a body focused learning experience. The mutable membrane becomes a heuristic device for the relational realm, a locus for debate, for change. Touch deprivation, exclusion and inequality are the consequence of an inaccessible visually dominant society. Three point of view chapters - from two visually impaired and one sighted company dancer - further describe the performance work, revealing how lives are changed and why sociocultural inclusion is imperative. Trade ReviewWithin the broad sweep of dance histories, we can overlook the complexity of how truly innovative practices emerge. This is a wonderfully in-depth account of Dymoke’s journey and the network of people (Paxton, Kilcoyne et al.) and events that led to the formation of Touchdown Dance and its concomitant breakthrough in inclusive pedagogy and praxis (which reached far beyond work with blind dancers). In a post pandemic era, it is also a timely reminder of the importance of touch and of the responsibility and role of dancer as researcher to question, explore and extend the boundaries of what we are told is possible. -- Adam BenjaminTable of ContentsList of Figures Abbreviations Preface Acknowledgements Introduction - An ethno-historical overview of the origins of Touchdown Dance: A radical initiative in a radical climate - Part 1. Taking a stand for inclusivity in an exclusive society - Part 2. The body as the locus of liberation - Part 3. Bringing CI and Touchdown Dance to Denmark 1. Returning to the Origins: The Journey Taken by the Founders - Part 1. A chance encounter – Where it all started - The first years of Touchdown Dance 1986–88 – Finding a common way of seeing using CI - Bringing visually impaired and sighted people together through CI - The first encounter – A mini revolution - Part 2. Touchdown Dance (1988–94), Breaking new ground, new discourses, new science, new praxis: Re-inhabiting the body brought into question the perception of the visible and invisible - Part 3. Finding my place 2. Methodology: Undertaking Research That Is Practice-Led - Contact Improvisation – Sowing the seeds of self-determination through touch and movement - CI – A practice-led approach to learning - Part 1. CI – The inter-relationship of pedagogy and practice-led research – The advent of an integrated and inclusive approach - Part 2. The foundational principles in practice - Vignette 1: An integrated exchange and inter-corporeal event – The three reciprocal membranes - Vignette 2: Touch – On the gap between physical and verbal language – The motile membrane between states of consciousness - Part 3. The role of discursive, ethnographic methods 3. Touch Communication: The Reciprocal Membrane of Inclusion - Part 1. Touching the skin is touching the membrane of the inner body - Part 2. In search of a natural attitude towards touch 4. The Pedagogic Process in Practice - Part 1. Introduction - Working with movement – A path towards change - CI – A sphere for cultural motility and mutability - The transitional state – New ways of seeing, moving and being - Part 2. The different modality-specific methods - Modality 1: The lower six inches - Modality 2: Rolling - Modality 3: Back-to-back sitting - Modality 4: Stand on ‘all fours’ – The low ‘bridge’ or ‘table’ - Modality 5: Lifts – Pathways into space and back to the floor 5. Workshops: Our Partnerships and Projects Since 1994 - Children - Youth work - How would you rate your movement skills before and after the workshop? - Adults 6. Performance and Creative Process - Sixth Sense – Second Sight: Practice-based research – In performance - Productions post 1994 - I-radiate – 1999–2000 - SENSE-8 2000–01 - TACT 2002–03 - CLOSER. Created 2005–08 reworked as APPARENTLY NORMAL 2010–12 - Follow the frame - 343 m/s – The speed of sound - 343 m/s Lisbon 7. Final Words - The paradigm shift – Towards the individual and collective – Embracing the membrane of inclusion - The research accomplishments and the return of non-touch - Capturing the experience – The multiple membranes 8. Three Touchdown Dance Artists’ Points of View - Introduction - Holly Thomas – Dancer and facilitator - Sharing practice - Performance work - Robert Anderson – Dancer and facilitator - Jamus Wood – Dancer and facilitator Afterword – Steve Paxton Appendix 1. The Small Dance 329 Appendix 2. The ‘Hatching Chick’ – And the ‘birth’ of the Membrane Concept Timeline Notes Bibliography

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Book SynopsisDrawing on avant garde and classical Japanese dance traditions, the Alishina Method offers a systematized approach to Butoh dance training for the first time in its history. With practical instruction and fully illustrated exercises, this book teaches readers:· basic body training and expression exercises· exercises to cultivate Qi (energy) and to aid improvisation· about katas (forms) and how to develop your own· the importance of voice, sound and music in Butoh· to collaborate and be in harmony with others· techniques to manipulate time and space· how to develop the imagination and refine the senses to enrich performance.This authentic approach to Japanese dance will be compelling reading for anyone interested in contemporary dance, performance arts, Japanese culture or personal development techniques.Trade ReviewJuju Alishina is an important and bold cultural innovator and searing performer. This writing captures the grace and power of Juju's teaching through clear exercises that offer students and teachers alike entrée into a form of Butoh infused with traditional Japanese movement practices. Rich with imagery, these lessons are layered with the wisdom, experience, and deep research of a master. -- Andrew Belser, Professor, MFA program, and Director, Arts & Design Research Incubator, Penn State UniversityTable of ContentsPreface. The Future of Butoh. Teaching Method. 1. Body Training: Basic Exercises. 2. Qi Training, Improvisation. 3. Application. Afterword. Bibliography. Biography.

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Book SynopsisAnna Halprin is a world-famous theatre artist and early pioneer in the expressive arts healing movement. This book explores her personal growth as a dancer and choreographer and the development of her therapeutic and pedagogical approach. The authors, who each trained with Halprin, introduce her creative work and the 'Life/Art Process®' she developed, an approach that takes life experiences as a source for artistic expression. They also examine the wider impact of Halprin's work on the fields of art, education, therapy and political action and discuss how she crossed the conventionally defined boundaries between them.Exploring Halprin's belief that dance can be a powerful force for transformation, healing, education, and making our lives whole, this book is a tribute to an exceptional body of artistic and therapeutic work and will be of interest to expressive arts therapists, dance movement psychotherapists, dancers, performance and community artists, and anyone with an interest in contemporary dance.Trade ReviewI found this book a comprehensive and rigorous account of Anna Halprin's work and its application and relevance today. The discussions on the boundaries between Art and Therapy in her work with the body are both radical and inspiring. As both a dance artist/performer (...) I find the depth of enquiry and capacity to understand the body in doing, making and developing a political structure quite profound. One would hope that more people today who are interested in Dance and Movement and the body in both contexts will take up this extraordinary account of a life's work. -- Kay Lynn * The Gestalt Centre; BGJ (British Gestalt Journal) and the Oxford Psychotherapy Society's members-only Journal *Readers will find that Anna Halprin: Dance, Process, Form is a detailed, well-researched, and objective examination of the life, work, and artistic mindset of Anna Halprin... the book is an interesting foray into where the process of expression in dance and therapy stands today, and also what it might mean for practitioners and performers going forward. -- Michael Fiorini * Somatic Psychotherapy Today *Table of ContentsPreface to the German edition. Anna Halprin. Foreword. Rudolf zur Lippe. Introduction. Ronit Land, Ursula Schorn and Gabriele Wittmann. 1. Anna Halprin: Her Life and Work. Gabriele Wittmann. 2. The 'Life/Art Process' – Building Blocks for Creative Action. Ursula Schorn. Dialogue 1. Challenges for the Critics. Ronit Land in Conversation with Gabriele Wittmann. 3. On the Phenomenon of Anna Halprin's Reception. Gabriele Wittmann. Dialogue 2. Challenges at the Interface between Art and Therapy. Gabriele Wittmann in Conversation with Ursula Schorn. 4. The Limits of Expression – The 'Life/Art Process' in the Therapeutic Context. Ursula Schorn. Dialogue 3. Emotionality in Pedagogical Work in the Multicultural Context. 5. Introducing Anna Halprin's Pedagogical Profile. Ronit Land. Notes. Photographs. Works. Bibliography. Films. Acknowledgements (Pictures). The Authors.

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Book SynopsisThe Javanese movement artist Suprapto Suryodarmo (universally known as Prapto) died in 2019. He had devoted his life to developing, embodying, teaching and sharing his practice of Amerta Movement / Joged Amerta, which, in his own words, is not only a language for communication but also an expression of being. In the course of his life, Prapto worked with students and colleagues (people from all walks of life, including internationally-known artists, performers, practitioners and teachers, all of whom he treated equally as ‘friends’) in sacred, ancient and mundane sites around the world. He never attempted to write down his practice, although he encouraged many ‘friends’ to spread the word and the practice, sharing their own understandings of his work widely. ​ This book, covering the early years of Prapto’s teaching, is the closest there is to a record of that period of his work in English. It is a radically revised, updated and edited version of Lise Lavelle’s doctoral thesis and draws on her unrivalled knowledge of the culture, language, art, religion and traditions of Java – the pot in which Prapto’s life, work and practice were cooked. ​ While Amerta Movement continued to evolve during this century, 'The Roots of Amerta Movement' offers a clear and many-layered introduction. For anyone wanting to know more about Prapto and his work, it is a very good place to start.Table of ContentsPART I: The Movement Chapter 1: Introduction to Amerta Movement Chapter 2: Prapto in Java Chapter 3: Fundamentals Chapter 4: The Movement Practice PART II: The Pribadi Art courses Chapter 5: Basic Chapter 6: Vocabulary 1: The Hill and Sukuh Chapter 7: Vocabulary 2: Borobudur, Parangtritis and Crystallisation Chapter 8. Communication PART III: Messenger Art Chapter 9. Messenger Art On the road to a Professional Art Language Conclusion Epilogue: Amerta on the Road in the 21st century Glossary Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisHow can we dance here - so the aliveness of everything past and present can surface and shimmer? Paula Kramer's beautiful, evocative and touching 'contemplations' take us on a double journey that starts with Site (one in Helsinki, one in Berlin), moves to Practice and concludes in Performance. Based on a 3-year site-based research project (a post-doc at Uniarts Helsinki's Centre for Artistic Research) the book explores her embodied research into intermateriality. It addresses the question that guided her research: how does movement and choreography emerge in collaboration with site? More specifically: how do bodies, materials, sites, organisms, history, tuning, training, phenomena, events and the weather intermingle and speak, bringing forth what we later might call movement, dance or choreography? The two sites are Lanskari - the wildest and least populated of Helsinki's Suomenlinna islands - and Martin-Gropius-Bau on Berlin's Sudplatz, a neighbour of the Berlin Wall, of Berlin's House of Representatives and former home of the first Stasi, and of the former SS and Gestapo headquarters. The book explores narration, poetry and theory born out of specific experiences of moving-dancing, being, eating, choreographing, performing, in and with the two sites. The author speaks alongside others - experts in history, geology, performance - and invites us to see and experience sites, dance and movement differently.Table of ContentsIntroduction Site: SUOMENLINNA - On Your Rocks I Lie The Slippery Rocks of Suomenlinna / Bjoern Kroeger Islands in Time / Annette Arlander Practice: SUOMENLINNA - Practising Movement The Feather / Annette Arlander Performance: SUOMENLINNA - On the Surface of Time Placement Upon The Surface of Time / Kira O'Reilly IF YOU SAY- a poetic contemplation STATE OF MATTER - Assembled memories of not being an audience / Jagna Anderson This is - not a performance :Performance GROPIUS - Practising Movement :Practice Sudplatz: 1910, 1936, 1954, 1984, and today, 2020 / Ulrich Tempel GROPIUS - You Are My Layering :Site Introduction

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Book SynopsisSkinner Releasing Technique (SRT), created by Joan Skinner, is a somatic movement, dance and creative practice with a core underlying principle of releasing blocked energy, held tension and habitual patterns in body mind. It enables us to move with greater freedom and ease whilst awakening creativity and spontaneity. The 21 contributors to this book describe how SRT informs their own movement and/or dance practice and influences wider fields of practice including meditation, architecture, poetic listening, visual art, writing, technology and choreography. For them SRT is a transformative and lifelong practice that deepens connections with self, other, more than human life forms and with natural and urban landscapes. This is a book for anyone drawn to explore body mind, somatic, movement and dance practices, and for those who are exploring ways of living in the world creatively, empathically and with more ease and natural grace.Table of ContentsIntroduction ~ Manny Emslie How to Disappear Completely ~ Sally Metcalf A Non-Linear Approach To Being Alive ~ Stephanie Skura Movement, Metaphysics & Imagination ~ Alex Crowe Becoming the Dancing ~ Bettina Neuhaus Beyond Technique ~ Polly Hudson Attending to Details of Difference ~ Julie Nathanielsz Manifesting Dance ~ Lizzy Le Quesne Principles in Practice ~ Wilhemeena Monroe Small Steps and Occasional Leaps ~ Julie Ludwick Half Century of Releasing ~ Jodi Blackburn-Roehl Listening into Clarity ~ Lily Kiara Dancing Inside Out ~ Gaby Agis A Journey towards Poetic Materiality ~ Sally E. Dean All These Strings in One Hand ~ Meaghen Buckley From a Ripple Comes a Wave ~ Julia Sasso Adapting SRT for adults with learning disabilities ~ Sophie Alder Mastery and Insignificance ~ Ruth Gibson Dancing the World with An Ethical Compass ~ Manny Emslie Landscape, Process, Being ~ Mary-Clare McKenna Greek Tragedy Meets Skinner Releasing Technique ~ Lionel Popkin My Time with Joan - Theresa Moriarty Glossary References

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Book SynopsisRock Songs starts as a walk of a few miles between the valley of the river Tywi/Towy and the heights of Y Mynydd Du/Black Mountain in Wales. It takes millions of years, meeting along the way the rocks and water that have formed the land, together with the trees, red kites and otters who pass through. Humans crowd in as well – saints, drovers, Romans, bikers and tourists. The great zen monk, Dōgen, is also walking and learns that mountains themselves walk, if you know how to look. Rock Songs began as a one-man movement performance of a river by Nick Sales and has become a book of poetry, reflection, ecology and zen reflection. It's illustrated with extensive photography by Steve Hopkins and beautifully designed by Christopher Binding.

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Book SynopsisCelebrated dance artist and body therapist Miranda Tufnell takes us on a moving and inspiring exploration of the field of dance and health. For 14 years she worked in a GP surgery in Cumbria and the book opens with a vivid account of an arts project that she and her collaborators ran there for people with long-term health conditions. This is a book about the body and movement, about imagination and health. It gathers many stories, voices and activities from artists, patients and health practitioners. The arts have long played a role in medicine and there is a substantial body of evidence for the potency of arts practice in strengthening our resources and capacity for wellbeing. While the work is sourced in the body and movement, it is not only written for people with a dance background. Listening creatively to the body strengthens our body intelligence and ability to look after ourselves effectively. Practitioners from many backgrounds come into this field and will find something of interest. This book sets out to inspire rather than to teach, to offer windows into practice, and to convey something of what it is like to work in this field.Trade Review"This book is a plea for dance as a means of moving beyond the anatomised, medicalised, sexualised body to the body as a vital portal into the shifting and complex nature of being alive. It takes the reader on journeys that weave together stories, insights and practical exercises. A rare and moving book and a companion for health practitioners, teachers, students, movers and those searching for creative expression." Niamh Dowling, Principal, RADATable of ContentsAcknowledgments Foreword Dr Gavin Young Preface My story of movement Introduction A medicine within PART 1 ‘A Breath of Fresh Air’ – an account of a project. Brenda Mallon and Miranda Tufnell PART 2 Approaches to Practice Breath Touch The practice of saying yes, Eva Karczag Between you and me Self care in times of chaos and violence, Michal Shahak Getting your bearings – movement and sensing Towards meaning – body, health and imagination ‘Chance of fair’ – writing with people with mental and physical health issues, Kay Syrad PART 3 Laying the Foundations – movement in early years development, Karen Adcock Doyle and Jasmine Pasch PART 4 Practitioner Accounts What is this pill called dance? – music and movement in hospital, Filipa Pereira-Stubbs Harry: the story of a child in hospital, Lisa Dowler (co-written with Kellie Rixon, Harry’s mother) Dancing recall: making connections, Daphne Cushnie Moving forward with Parkinson’s, Amanda Fogg Breath and becoming in mental health and addiction, Sister Bridget Folkard A dance for Buddug, Cai Tomos What is health? Permissions Illustrations Biographies of Contributors Bibliography and Resources

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Book SynopsisBrings together the wisdom and learning from nearly five decades of study, practice and teaching at the forefront of somatic movement, embodied awareness, somatic and transpersonal psychotherapy, and spiritual disciplines.

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Book SynopsisThis choreographed book is dedicated to the phenomenon of the bare body in contemporary performance. This work of artistic research draws on philosophical, biopolitical, and ethical discourses relevant to the appearance of bare bodies in choreography, setting a framework for a reflexive movement between affect and ethics, sensuous address and response. Acts of exposure and concealment are culturally situated and anchored, and are examined for their methodological and nanopolitical significance. The concepts of anarchic responsibility and choreo-ethics lead to a reevaluation of contact, relationship, and solidarity. Choreography is thus understood as a complex field of revelatory experiences based on ecologies of aesthetic perception and ethico-political agency.

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