soma <> σῶμα

Wikipedia σῶμα

on reading about anatomy

As you move through different materials and engage in your own explorations, and especially if you start reading about anatomy, don’t be alarmed when you discover that the same word can be used to describe different anatomical structures, or physiological phenomena.

It may help to check when the material was published, and by whom.

If you ever get disoriented when reading about a particular structure, take a moment, and—when ready—reread the sentence that confused you, retrace the image, give yourself some time, and a new experience.

If a definition of a structure or a property does not make sense, if it evokes no feeling in you, that description might simply not work for you. Find one that does.

Start with those descriptions, those images that you can make sense of in-the-moment, no matter how basic they may be; work with them, understand them, play with them until they stop making sense. When an image that meant the world to you becomes a bit boring, underwhelming, or simply stops capturing your attention is usually when you’re ready to look for a new image; maybe a slightly more complex image, a more detailed description, or a more nuanced interpretation. Remember that the experience of learning is cyclical. Read about the learning curve.

hands on procedure, the ethic of:

1. always touch yourself first;
2. ask before placing your hands on another person;
3. check in with your partner, even if you think it’s unnecessary, inquire into their experience;
4. practice patience (regulate through your parasympathetic nervous system);
5. remember that you’re receiving stimuli, wait for your partner’s body to come to you, remember my suggestion to call the sense of your partner’s anatomy to your hands;
6. remember that the cells of your hands are in touch with the cells of your partner’s body first;
7. check in with your partner, even if you think it’s unnecessary, inquire into their experience;
8. remember the principle what you measure with determines what you can measure, call to your own senses the part of your own anatomy to attract the experience of that same anatomical aspect in your partner (if you want to get in touch with their CSF, contact your own CSF first).

these principles and others you’d discover for yourself through practice define what i call the non-invasive characteristic of the BMC® approach. remember that you are not going into your partner’s body, but calling their body to you.

in case you’re interested or become interested in invasive approaches, practice non-invasive approaches first. learn how to check in with your partner regularly, and build a trusting relationship before you start considering invasiveness.

invasiveness or non-invasiveness are not in-and-of-themselves good or bad characteristics of any approach. each could serve a purpose. there’s a time and a place for everything. what influences their value between people is the ethic you develop and embody in and through your practice.

nervous system classification

• the nervous system can be classified in several ways.
• central (brain and spinal cord);
• peripheral.
• somatic (intentional),
• autonomic (homeostasis):
1. sympathetic (fright, flight, or freeze),
2. parasympathetic (rest and recuperation).

reflex

Most frequently, a reflex will be defined as an involuntary action activated through “a reflex arc” in response to a specific stimuli. In class, we looked at an example of a reflex arc when we looked at the sensory-motor coördination (see below for image).

One of the crucial characteristics of a reflex is that it requires stimulation to occur. In BMC®, a reflex is often described as existing in a state of potential until that time comes when it is embodied in response to an appropriate stimulus. In class, we stepped on a balancing ball to trigger some of those reflexes that BMC® classifies under righting reactions.

Remember the Moro reflex? The one that extended our arms laterally to support us in regaining a sense of orientation and balance? Remember how quickly the Moro reflex showed itself in some bodies? You can often recognise involuntary actions relative to how quickly they show up. You can also recognise them by asking the person, Did you notice what you did with your arms? Look at their face when you ask them a question like that, you may get to appreciate the most wonderful expression of surprise.

Here are some examples of definitions of reflexes I found online:

“Reflexes are automatic and involuntary actions the body produces in response to certain stimuli. While some reflexes can involve muscles and movement, others involve internal processes within the body.”

Megan Monte What are reflexes? Definition and examples

“[…] according to 1989 guidelines issued by the American Academy of Neurology, “[…] Primitive reflexes and vegetative functions […] are either controlled by the brainstem or are so elemental that they require no brain regulation at all.”

PubMed Central (PMC) What is a reflex? A guide for understanding disorders of consciousness

“REFLEXES are processed in the spine and the low-brain. They are our most primitive responses.”

Internet Archive Sensing, feeling, and action : the experiential anatomy of body-mind centering : Cohen, Bonnie Bainbridge

• RIGHTING REACTIONS (page 127-129)
• MORO REFLEX (page 144-145)

sensory-motor coördination

Broadly speaking, sensory receptor registers proximity to heat, triggering the sensory nerve. The sensory nerve delivers electric and chemical stimuli to the back of the spinal cord, and via the inter neuron, passes the stimuli to the motor nerve. The motor nerve reaches from the front of the spinal cord towards the periphery, engaging appropriate responses via effector organs, mainly muscles and glands.

(note: In class, we did not look at sensory receptors and effector organs.)

Remember the conversation in which we compared compared sensing to a motor response, whereby the act of sensing becomes evident in the physiological changes you’re experiencing as you’re relating to the environment? As opposed to it [sensing] being compared with the words you speak to yourself internally when you decide that you are, indeed, sensing something?

homeostasis

In biology, homeostasis (British also homoeostasis; /hɒmioʊˈsteɪsɪs, -miə-/) is the state of steady internal physical and chemical conditions maintained by living systems.[1] This is the condition of optimal functioning for the organism and includes many variables, such as body temperature and fluid balance, being kept within certain pre-set limits (homeostatic range).

from Wikipedia

tensegrity

Tensegrity refers to structurally sound constructions that feature a radical separation of compression and tension. Generally the compression members are wooden or metal struts, while the tensional members are cables, rubber bands, string or steel wires. Tensegrity structures are admired as with gossamer tendons or struts, their solid struts seem almost magically suspended in air.

for more go to

buckyfullerinstitute Tensegrity

fascia

Traditionally, the word fascia was used primarily by surgeons to describe the dissectible tissue seen in the body encasing other organs, muscles, and bones. Recently, the definition has been broadened to include all collagenous based soft tissues in the body, including cells that create and maintain the extracellular matrix. The new definition also includes certain tendons, ligaments, bursae, endomysium, perimysium, and epimysium.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK526038/

the meninges

The brain and spinal cord are enveloped within three layers of membrane collectively known as the meninges, with the cranial meninges specifically referring to the section that covers the brain. From superficial to deep, the three layers are the dura, arachnoid, and pia—the term “mater,” Latin for mother, often follows these names (i.e., dura mater, arachnoid mater, pia mater).[1] The dura, Latin for “hard,” is composed of dense connective tissue and adheres to the inner surface of the skull and vertebrae. The arachnoid is a thin, wispy membrane that lies just deep to the dura and is superficial to the pia, the very thin, clear membrane that directly adheres to the surface of the brain and spinal cord. Forming from these layers are three clinically significant spaces, or potential spaces (sometimes called cavities): the epidural, subdural, and subarachnoid spaces, from superficial to deep. The chief function of the meninges is to protect the contents of the brain and spinal cord.[2]

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK539882/

cerebrospinal fluid

The CSF [CerebroSpinal Fluid] is clear and very slow moving. Its movement is powered by the cranial-scaral/coccygeal pump (movement between the skull and the tail). It has its own rhythic cycle called the CSF Rhythm (CSFR) which is different than theblood pulse and respiratory rhythms. Like the blood pulse, the CSFR can be felt in all parts of the body.

Internet Archive Sensing, feeling, and action : the experiential anatomy of body-mind centering : Cohen, Bonnie Bainbridge

(page 78)

CSF appears to have several important functions. One of these functions is to provide a buoyant force to support the brain and spinal cord. The brain has a significant amount of mass (approximately 1500 gm) while at the same time being relatively malleable. However, since the CSF surrounds the brain, it dissipates much of the downward force that would normally act on the organ. This dissipation reduces the stress on the brain and allows it to maintain its shape. When surrounded by adequate CSF, the brain exerts significantly less tension on exiting nerve roots.[5] Another function of CSF that comes from its physical properties as fluid is to protect the brain from the damage that would result from a sudden movement of the skull. Any rapid acceleration/deceleration of the head has the potential to injure the delicate contents contained within. The CSF helps reduce the potential damage in such an event by acting as a cushion and a shock absorber.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK470578/

24:26 “Words are the part of silence that can be spoken.”

Beyond IDOCDE, a love letter to a study of documenting dance;

Tower Seminar on Dance Archiving, organised by Jenny Roche at the Irish World Academy, University of Limerick

In 2013, after about five and a half years living in Bruxelles, I moved to Stockholm to study at the Stockholm University of the Arts’ MFA program New Performative Practices, created and directed—until recently—by Chrysa Parkinson. Soon thereafter I received a phone call from Francesco Scavetta, a choreographer and a teacher I met back when I lived in Salzburg. Francesco told me about the Erasmus+ project he was supporting as a partner institution, called IDOCDE. At the time, I knew nothing about Erasmus+, “partner institutions”, or any of the many Erasmus+ categories, evaluation methodologies, etc.

As a partner of the project, Francesco said, one of his responsibilities was to organise events during which IDOCDE was going to be presented to the professional audience. His only problem was the location of his institution. Vitlycke — Centre for Perofrming Arts is situated north of Göteborg, on Sweden’s west coast, a literal stone-throw away from a rock nested in the forest floor known for more than 500 engraved images that were carved into its surface during the Bronze Age. You get the picture, that’s remote. Since I lived in Stockholm and had an interest in discourse-weaving and knowledge-making, Francesco thought I’d be the perfect candidate to do the job he needed done.

I’d just learned about Danscentrum, an association that offers daily classes to local professionals, rents rehearsal space to members at affordable prices, and helps professionals access the support of the Swedish Union for Performing Arts and Film (Fackförbundet Scen & Film). Danscentrum personnel was welcoming and helped me organise my first IDOCDE-related event where I talked to local professionals about the IDOCDE project.

IDOCDE stands for International Documentation of Contemporary Dance Education. [pronunciation] The project’s first iteration concerned the making of the IDOCDE website, which was going to create an extra-institutional space for dance professionals—particularly dance educators—to store their research and their documentation and engage in content-specific peer-to-peer exchange***. Imagine the best characteristics of LinkedIn, Facebook, and the Research Catalogue all wrapped up into a single platform eagerly populated by independent dance researchers, artists and educators alike. Talking about utopia.

https://www.idocde.net

Kerstin Kussmaul, the originator of the IDOCDE project, often talked about IDOCDE in terms of accessibility. She’d often talk about the time peer-review takes, about how biased peer-review can be, and about the potential negative consequence of unchecked institutional bias for knowledge-creation overall. Her solution was to offer the possibility for a professional to release their research first, and follow that up by engaging in a peer-to-peer exchange, where—in dialogue—both the researcher and their audience get to determine the value of that particular research from an acknowledged, situated perspective.

The IDOCDE project’s final dissemination effort (dissemination is another of the Erasmus+ categories I did know anything about in 2013) was the IDOCDE Symposium. The first IDOCDE Symposium took place at the ImPulsTanz — Vienna International Dance Festival in the summer of 2013. With this symposium the IDOCDE project was officially completed, the website released, and the conditions set for the next 10 years of IDOCDE symposia.

http://www.idocde.net/pages/192

I first attended the IDOCDE symposium the following summer, when—as one of the Swedish delegates—I presented a paper entitled On Teaching and the Importance of Being Not. One of the questions I’d ask with this paper was, How do we, as teachers, address the fact that some skills cannot be built under supervision, whilst others cannot be build without it? And what does that mean, to make things practical, in terms of time? Where the question isn’t anymore about whether one should be supervised or not, but at what time, and for how long?

Before I knew it, I’d joined the IDOCDE team.

Because of the guidelines that determine the function of Erasmus+, one cannot simply extend their funding. One can only continue working on an existing project with financial support afforded by Erasmus+, by doing so within the context of a new project.

Our new project was called LEAP. LEAP stands for Learn, Exchange, Apply, Practice. The project’s postulate was fairly simple. Now that we had the IDOCDE website, we wanted to create a project where a group of dance pedagogues, all associates of partner institutions, got to engage in peer-to-peer exchange concerned specifically with the topic of dance documentation and archiving of movement practice, teaching, and non-verbal skills and knowledges. During this exchange, the IDOCDE website served as a resource to all involved in this project, as both a documentation and a dissemination device. This meant that everyone involved needed to learn how to use the IDOCDE website. This also meant that, by using the website, the website was gaining visibility. Through LEAP years, the IDOCDE symposia remained this project’s primary dissemination event.

After the LEAP years came the REFLEX years. Those were some of the most interesting years for me. Where IDOCDE focused on creating the website, a useful tool, LEAP on implementing that tool and exploring its use within a controlled environment, REFLEX aimed at creating a research tool and guide that was to help facilitate learning through documentation outside of the aforementioned controlled environment, namely, the community of researchers, artists, and pedagogues directly involved with the project. REFLEX, in other words, was going to try and account for what we’ve been discovering during the IDOCDE and LEAP years. Namely, that many dance professionals that attended our events and made use of our platforms had strong, often negative, feelings (!) towards dance documentation which prevented them***

https://www.mindthedance.com

At the time, one of my job titles was that of the co-editor of the IDOCDE website, a function I served next to the website’s original editor, Defne Erdur. Defne was developing the REFLEX tool and guide when I became the website user’s primary contact. With more of my time spent in conversation with the users of our website and given REFLEX’s mission, I was able to discern the three most common issues our users were dealing with:

1. technology: many of our users had limited computer skills. Especially where dance educators were concerned, many of the professionals we were working with were of the generation that reached adulthood and developed their careers before computers took over, let alone the internet. Over the years, I noticed many talked about computers as tools that were unnecessarily complicated to use and gave little to no sensory feedback, which made using them texturally uninteresting. Many failed to develop any œffective relationship with their devices. Many questioned whether developing aeffective relationships with their devices was worth it;
2. time: many of our users had little time on their hands. The IDOCDE website and symposia catered to independent researchers, primarily artists and educators, who could barely afford enough time to do their work well in life. Time for reflection, documentation, and preparation was often stolen, be it by the artist (from another activity) or from the artist (by another activity);
3. community: with most people lacking skills and/or time, and IDOCDE being a singular resource with a weak support system, rare was the example of a person who regarded their documentation practice as specifically useful in the way they navigated their professional context. Furthermore, many people I talked to, who did develop a documentation practice, developed it accidentally, or else benefited from it accidentally. or better, unintentionally. Many developed their practice as a result of having a special interest, rather than a clear understanding of the professional benefit of the practice.

It took reading Sara Ahmed to understand that these common issues, as I called them, all pointed to larger socio-economic and structural problems that were clearly affecting the members of our community.

By the end of REFLEX years and the onset of the pandemic, the IDOCDE project came to a close. Having organised many workshops (dissemination events) as well as three instalments of the IDOCDE symposium, the REFLEX project completed its mission with the publishing of the online tool and guide, www.mindthedance.com. Through this collection of essays, exercises, scores, and interviews, and under no supervision, the REFLEX project continues to meet its aim “to inspire dance teachers towards integrating documentation ideas into their practices – to guide and to give resources for the art of reflective teaching”. The summer after the REFLEX project was completed, with the money we saved up over the years, the members of the IDOCDE team—myself included—organised the 10th and the last IDOCDE Symposium.

IRA Ferris’S PHOTOS

Imagined as a celebration of the decade the team spent working on the IDOCDE Symposium, to organise this symposium we turned to Plato whose own Symposium reflects the ancient Greek tradition of gathering after a meal in a conversation accompanied by dancing, singing, reciting, and playing and listening to music. The last IDOCDE Symposium invited no speakers, organised no panels. Instead, everyone attending the Symposium joined the circle hosted at the beginning and the end of the day, in which the community slurped on freshly cut pieces of watermelon. Between the circles, attendees were invited to speak, sing, study, dance, observe, rest, drink and eat, and think of every activity, no matter how visible, as evidencing something known. In terms of representing knowledges emergent in the field of dance science, both within and without the symposium, this was, arguably, our most successful symposium to date.

Since the last IDOCDE Symposium, all my personal efforts have been focused on the establishment of IDOCDE’s successor, the LACE Symposium for Dance and Other Contemporary Practices—which I’ve been doing alone with one other of my remaining IDOCDE colleagues, Deirdre Morris, and a new team member, Sylvia Scheidl. To continue organising the symposium, Deirdre, Sylvia, and I had to develop a new project with which we successfully secured access to new Erasmus+ funds and, of course, a series of brand, new goals—none of which concern further development of the IDOCDE website. For the time being, the IDOCDE website remains active, but without active moderation or access to IT support its capacities are dwindling.

I am currently negotiating the possibility of turning the IDOCDE website into a literal archive. Were this transformation to occur, IDOCDE.net would lose its interactive component. The question that keeps me awake at night is this, How does the existence of the interactive component inform any of our reading of the documentation currently accessible via IDOCDE.net? How does, in other words, knowing that documents could be added, removed, edited, or re-contextualised by their authors at any time in the future inform our current reading and understanding of these documents’ purpose? This question reminds me of the fourth most common issue I was able to discern during REFLEX years:

4. finiteness: many users reported on having trouble accepting the limit of any document mediated through an interface that isn’t ontologically/epistemologically/phenomenologically relational and/or oral, that isn’t itself “alive”, since that limit—in and of itself—contradicts the primary condition and characteristic of dancing, it being “lived”.

For a long time, something about these issues bothered me. Each one of them, I thought, describes a difficulty, but not an impossibility. Let’s say one might not know how to use the internet. One could learn how to use the internet, couldn’t one? At least some of the people I was talking to over the years, who didn’t know how to use the internet at the time of our conversation, could have been learning how to use the internet instead of complaining. At least those who had access to intellectual, physical, emotional, and financial resources, and necessary gear and training could have been. But what if it’s not a matter of capacity, but rather a matter of preference; what if they chose not to? The same way, perhaps, the Old Norse chose not to use their runes to write down delicate details pertaining to their religion and cosmology, insisting instead on communicating a wide range of information orally, and exclusively during ritual ceremony. Which is something you may want to do some research on, just saying.

What I realised, thanks to the Old Norse insistence, is that I interpreted the value of the issues I was learning from the users of the IDOCDE website incorrectly. These were not issues, in as much as they were not to be resolved. Quite the contrary, these were the values that IDOCDE users wanted their documentation practices to embody and represent. Looking back through the IDOCDE website while preparing for this talk, I am looking at a project that ended at the beginning. A project that runs the risk of failing their community if we do not find a way to communicate our discoveries and support development of new tools and communities that would make it possible for more people to gather around more experiment and eventually inform the making of new spaces.

alys & pav artists’ (e)books

Alys and Pavle 2020

alys and pavle 2021

When I make an artists’ (e)book with my friend Alys Longley of Aotearoa New Zealand, I do so knowing that I am making a dance. Also knowing that most people who I present this book while calling it a dance will look at me funny and think me cute, if I’m lucky. Every once in a while, however, Alys and I will host an event where, together with other artists presenting their works, we will leaf through our books knowing that we created the conditions necessary for these dances to be felt. The laughter and the tears and the stories told after the turn of the last page will have all attested to our success.

• note on online symposia, expanding audience because of not traveling and not being bound to the same timezone, which is actually an issue now that we’re streaming because people may not be so interested in watch the symposium on zoom.
• the years after the pandemic we had online moderators. but last year, for example, with online moderators most joining the streams would not even switch their camera on? that remains confusing.

discarded:

Which brings me to today, hello, when I’m standing before you with alinear questions that are difficult-though-not-impossible to reflect in language succinctly, but that I currently cannot really afford to work on. Questions that, nevertheless, occupy my imaginary, interfere with my practice, condition my interactions, and sometimes simply stupefy.