Symposia trilogy

Wright-ing the Somatic - August 2016 Narrating the Somatic: gathering voices, sharing practices - February 2018 Queering the Somatic: interrupting the narrative - August 2019 Guest editor editorial <blockquote>Middlesex University, London 2016, 2018, 2019.</blockquote>
In crowded meeting room, two women stand talking to each other.
photo: L. Gilby

Three symposiums organised and hosted by Helen Kindred and I, all three were held at Middlesex University.

Wright-ing the Somatic – August 2016

Narrating the Somatic: gathering voices, sharing practices – February 2018

Queering the Somatic: interrupting the narrative – August 2019

Helen Kindred and I guest edited an edition of the Journal for Dance and Somatic practices (Special Issue: Wright-ing the Somatic, Narrating the Bodily Vol. 11, no.1) based derived from the three Symposia

View pdf of editorial 

Wright-ing the Somatic, Middlesex University (2016)As artists, scholars, and practitioners of dance we understand that the embodied experience underpins meaning making, but how is this somatic understanding captured and shared as knowledge without disrupting its corporeal origins? Why is it important to share and communicate embodied knowing? How are choreographic processes, and other explorations in movement become methodology for understanding the lived experience? In partnership with the ISTD and One Dance UK, this symposium explored how we craft the somatic and document that inquiry from ‘in physicality’ to ‘in text’. We brought together existing published academics, visual documenters of movement – photography and film-, movers, and choreographers practicing professionally in the field. Across the two days there were panel discussions, lecture demonstrations, masterclasses, workshops, academic paper presentations, & performances. Our aim is to expand the dance dialogue across art forms and ideas making meaningful connections and making space for alternative ways of experiencing and seeing the somatic. 

Keynotes: Anita Gonzales (founding member of Urban Bush Women) and John R. Diehl (dance photographer)

Guest contributors include Funmi Adewole, Christopher Bannerman, Namron, Vida Midgelow, Helen Kindred, Adesola Akinleye, Michael Joseph, H. Patten, Sandra Golding, Maxine Brown, Nathan Geering, and Ginny Brown.

Film by Anton Califano 

Narrating the Somatic, Middlesex University (2018). As scholars-artists and practitioners of dance and somatic studies, we understand that the embodied experience underpins meaning making, but how is this bodily understanding captured, shared, and stories articulated as knowledge without disrupting its felt origins. Why is it important to share and communicate embodied knowing? How are choreographic processes and other explorations in movement a methodology for understanding our personal, historical, cultural narratives? The symposium explored how we tell the tales of our embodied experiences and share our practices…narrating the somatic. The Symposium brought together existing published academics, visual documentaries of movement (photography/film), and movers and choreographers practicing professionally in the field. Across the day there were panel discussions, lecture demonstrations, masterclasses, workshops, academic paper presentations, & performances. Our aim is to expand the dance dialogue across art forms and ideas making meaningful connections and making space for alternative ways of experiencing and seeing the somatic. We also celebrated in the book launch of Narratives in Black British Dance: embodied practices (link).

Keynotes: Richard Walsh, Rosemary Lee & Jackie Guy

Guest contributors include Chikukwango Cuxima, Nina Atkinson, Sandra Golding, Anton Califano & Adesola Akinleye, Mary Grigg (Savva), Louise Kateraga, Book launch: Ola Johanson & Jackie Guy, Akosua Boakye & dancers, Pawlet Brookes, Stephanie Scheubeck, Namron, Jacqueline McCormick, Helen Kindred, Eline Kieft, Vivian Vieira, Dominique Rivoal.

Filmed by Jaha Browne; Film edit and production by Anton Califano 

Queering the Somatic: interrupting the narrative, Middlesex University (2019). As scholars-artists and practitioners of dance and somatic studies, we understand that the embodied experience underpins meaning making, but how is this bodily understanding captured, shared, and stories articulated as knowledge without disrupting its felt origins. Dance can be seen as a critical way of being in the world. For us dance emphasises the felt over the ‘named’, dispelling binaries and challenging Western constructs of the passive body. Queer theory is a field of critical thinking emerging in the early 1990’s drawing on feminism and Queer studies to challenge social constructs and identities. Moving beyond the social constructs of the body both dance and Queer theory offer a fluidity for narrating the lived experience; narrations that interrupt dominant stories of identity and how we move through the world. Queering the somatic offers opportunities to explore, challenge and celebrate the act of dispelling binaries: mind-body, male-female, subject-object. The symposium is revelling in how we might re-imagine, re-educate, re-think, reveal and allow ‘us’ to re-create a world without the limits of binaries that reflect the somatic experience of Being in the world.  Across the two days there were panel discussions, lecture demonstrations, masterclasses, workshops, academic paper presentations, & performances. Our aim is to expand the dance dialogue across art forms and ideas making meaningful connections and making space for alternative ways of experiencing and seeing the somatic. 

Keynote: Thomas F. DeFrantz

Guest contributors: Carolina Vasilikou, Elaine Westwick, Anna Martine Whitehead, Danny Tokay Reid, Sam Causer, Stephanie Scheubeck, Jac Coxall, Helen Kindred, Nicolette Wilson-Clarke, Amber Oretege, Niurca Marquez and Cristina Fernandez-Rosa, with Queer history walk of London in the evening led by 

Film by Anton Califano