Stories of West African and House Dance Pedagogies: 4E Cognition Meet Rhythmic Virtuosity

Banks, Ojeya Cruz

doi:10.1080/15290824.2021.1942477

Cited by 3 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 17 publications

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“…Explicit awareness of the sense of self-movement, or kinesthesis, as a mode of self-coordination is central to the practice of dancing. Rhythmic awareness and practice sit at the center of many dances, wherein there is a mutual coordination between musician and dancer ( Cruz Banks, 2021 ). In the historical traditions of modern and post-modern concert dance, which are the authors’ areas of expertise, educators and choreographers sought to separate music as a source of the dancer’s energetic coordination and prioritize the self as the source of rhythmic output.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Experiencing Rhythm in Dance

Wilson

Henley²

2022

Front. Psychol.

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In this article, two dance educators offer a definition of rhythm from both educational and performance perspectives and discuss pedagogical practices that waken students’ awareness to rhythm as a lived-experience over which they have creative control. For the dancer, in the midst of the dance, rhythms are, in the words of Margaret H’Doubler, recurring patterns of measured energy. These patterns are nested in scales from the moment-to-moment shifts in muscular contraction and release to the rise and fall of dramatic tension in a performed dance. This approach to rhythm runs counter to many dance students’ studio-based training in which rhythm is equated to synchronizing accents to a specific meter. The authors describe pedagogical practices in the studio that foster engagement with rhythm as lived-experience. Drawing attention to their kinesthetic experience while moving, students are encouraged to modulate levels of exertion embedded in the qualities of movement they are experiencing. As varying levels of exertion are attended to across temporal durations, students notice patterns as they emerge and recur. This attention to recurring patterns of measured exertion is, the authors claim, the lived-experience of rhythm in dance.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%