photo:  Robert Zbikowsk; dancers: Kaitlin Clipsham and Teoma Naccarato

Body Talk: Dance As Language

by Christine Jackson

Introduction

The introduction of dance as a separate discipline in the elementary arts curriculum in Ontario in 2008 was met with a range of responses ranging from fear and outrage to optimism and celebration. Fourteen years later, the range of sentiments persists. Teachers are doing their very best. Arts curriculum specialists and the Council of Ontario Drama and Dance Educators (CODE) have generated an impressive array of resources which countless teachers access with enthusiasm and appreciation. Another key source of support is the dance community; how rich it is to learn from and with a dance artist - students and teachers, together! This engagement with community becomes especially important as we move beyond the expectations of the 2008 curriculum and begin to decentre Euro-western dance, and respectfully introduce diverse cultural traditions and vocabularies in dance. Friend and dance artist Debbie Nicholls-Skerritt’s words, spoken to my students, ring in my ears: “Representation matters. Voice matters”. We can only avoid cultural appropriation and move towards decolonization through practices and relationships founded on this principle. So, let’s cultivate relationships with community to cultivate rich cultural contexts for learning and expand the lexicon of dance for our students and ourselves. At the same time, let’s devise learning experiences that engage our students as dancers and choreographers, creating from their own social positions, drawing on their own lived experiences, and using an ever-expanding personal vocabulary of dance.  

How do we begin? I propose that one way to start is with an understanding of dance-in-education as the study of dance as a language – a communication system of embodied signs and symbols which can be manipulated to represent and communicate ideas, thoughts and feelings. This view of dance as a language is inspired by my collaboration with many dance artists and teaching colleagues. I thank Glenys McQueen-Fuentes who was the first to open my eyes to the meaning-making capacities of our physical selves. Glennys taught me that the language of dance provides students with another voice; that which Michael Trent (dancer/choreographer) refers to as “a physical voice”(Cornell, 2001); “just another way of speaking”(Trent, 2012). When the physical voice is added to the chorus of classroom voices, new voices are heard. Time and again, teachers are delighted and surprised by the work of students who struggle with the more conventional modes of speaking and writing, but communicate so eloquently through their physical voice. 

Multiple Intelligence Theory

Many teachers attribute the remarkable dance creations of these students to Howard Gardner’s Theory of Multiple Intelligence (1983/1999/2011), which holds that all individuals have several, relatively autonomous intelligences that they deploy in varying combinations to solve problems or create products that are valued in one or more culture (Kornhaber, 2019).  

Despite contestation of his theories (Kincheloe, ed. 2004, Glazzard, 2015) and Gardner’s own concerns about how his work has been taken up and misunderstood, Gardner’s Theory of Multiple Intelligences has found an enduring home in the field of education. This statement by Gardner in a 1997 interview may account for why:

If we all had exactly the same kind of mind and there was only one kind of intelligence, then we could teach everybody the same thing in the same way and assess them in the same way and that would be fair. But once we realize that people have very different kinds of minds, different kinds of strengths—some people are good in thinking spatially, some in thinking language, others are very logical, other people need to be hands-on and explore actively and try things out—then education, which treats everybody the same way, is actually the most unfair education. (Edutopia, 2009, 1:37)

Current educational policies and practices (Growing Success, Ontario Curriculum Documents, UDL, DI) orient schools and teachers to diversify their strategies and approaches to meet the needs of all learners and to honour the multiple ways in which their students are intelligent. For many teachers, dance serves this pedagogical drive to meet diverse learning styles and needs. 

The dance curriculum clearly addresses the bodily kinesthetic frame of mind, as students are directly engaged through the sensing, feeling, moving mode of their bodies. Students who have “appetite for movement” (Cunningham,1977) are in their element when the opportunities for kinesthetic learning are offered.  It is actually an equity issue; many students need to escape the tyranny of the desk-hold to do their best learning. Spatial intelligence is also at play as students move through space making mental maps and carving choreography of the angles, shapes, relationships they encounter. This connects mathematically to the patterns and formations of their dance and the pattern and rhythm of the music accompanying the choreography. Interpersonal intelligence develops as students collaborate and negotiate with one another to give shape and form to their ideas through dance. The intrapersonal domain is enhanced as their dance explorations deepen their understanding of themselves, and the world around them (Koff 2017, 2021).

Later in his theoretical ponderings, Gardner proposed that we may also possess an existential or spiritual intelligence that gives rise to philosophical questions about the nature of existence. I embrace the notion of existential exploration in dance as I have witnessed countless students traverse these planes of ambiguity and uncertainty with their physical voices. Dance is a way to concretize abstract questions and concepts when words seem insufficient. Finally, linguistic intelligence is a frame of mind that is crucial to this discussion. Checkley defined linguistic intelligence as “the capacity to use language, your native language, and perhaps other languages, to express what’s on your mind and to understand other people (1997). I understand dance to be one of these “other languages’ referenced by Gardner. For teachers who are already proficient in the teaching of Language, it may be helpful to think of dance as a form of linguistic intelligence. Teachers can approach the teaching of both language and dance with a focus on personal meaning-making, a valuing of process, and an honouring of cultural contexts and connections.  

Embodied Thinking and Being

Departing from the psychology basis of Multiple Intelligences Theory, I am drawn to practise-based frameworks that reflect the social and political dimensions of teaching. 

Jan Deans’ research (2016) helps me understand the ways in which dance offers a different kind of space for learning; a space where I can confront my own complicity in oppressive educational practices and begin to follow different pedagogical impulses. Deans’ investigation of the “bodily-felt spatio-temporal-energic experience” of dance helps guide these impulses. Her research identifies three key domains that support student learning in dance: Embodied Thinking, Multi-modal Semiosis, and Multi-Focal Relating (p.51).  I offer this brief synopsis of the domains, with some examples, to highlight the thinking, moving and relating dimensions of dance as a language.  Embodied Thinking involves reasoning, creative thinking, and playful problem-solving. When I invite students to bodystorm and improvise, to negotiate and create a dance phrase, to interpret a poem with their physical voice, or to integrate pattern and sequence into their choreography, I am asking them to think in, with, and through their bodies.  Embodied thinking, as I understand it, is the bodymind harmonized and actively engaged in making-meaning processes. Multi-modal Semiosis is about using multiple modalities to inspire dance-making. This might be the read-aloud of a picture book, the composition of a soundscape, the painting of a mural, devising a tableau, writing a poem, or taking a nature walk. There are so many possibilities; so many ways to engage the senses, stimulate the imagination, and inspire creative expression through dance! Deans’ findings indicate that this stacking of the deck with multiple modalities has the effect of sustaining engagement and nudging students into new territories of learning. Multi-Focal Relating speaks to the personal and social dimensions of dance-in- education. Deans notes that self-awareness and self-confidence develop alongside “relationship-based behaviours, such as respecting the personal space of others and engaging in empathetic body-based reflections where individuals embrace the perspectives of their peers by reflecting and responding to their feeling states” (Deans, p.7).  Students gain a sense of personal power and group power through their creation of compelling dance work. They relate to one another through the processes of collaborative creation, the sharing of their work, and the processes of receiving and giving feedback. It is also about those rare moments when the classroom community is stilled by the power of something they have created. 

These three domains describe a powerful pedagogical approach to teaching dance. Thinking with our bodies, connecting across diverse knowledge systems, and bringing one’s self-knowledge to relational creativity is transgressive. It subverts the colonial logic that directs so much of our practice. Simply moving the desks to the sidelines and meeting in a circle to embody our presence with one another, to think with one another, and relate to one another through, in, and with our bodies disrupts the institutional constraints of our everyday classroom. Most importantly, it makes possible different ways of knowing, being, and communicating. 

Embodied Voices

Student voice is another prevalent focus in the field of education today is student voice at the Ministry of Education defines student voice as a “metaphor for student engagement and participation in issues that matter to learning” (MOE, p.3). It goes on to explain how educators are “addressing the tensions inherent when embedding student voice within the curriculum”. Inquiry-based learning, pedagogical documentation and listening are emphasized as integral to student voice. This is not how I understand student voice. Student voice is not a metaphor. It is not a tension to be dealt with. It is not a teacher strategy. Student voice is student identity; complex and vulnerable; often systematically silenced or disregarded. And it is powerful when provided a real platform (not a metaphorical one). I don’t understand how scholars and practitioners can talk about student voice without even mentioning the arts; dance in particular, as a language that is personal, embodied, and highly communicative through its visceral resonance. Dance is the body talking; it is embodied voice. 

“Whose voices are we hearing in the acoustics of the school?”, asks Ruddack (cited in MOE, p. 1). This is a significant question. To answer this question, we must listen, take stock, and take action. Are teacher voices dominant?  Are the same student voices taking up space in our classrooms?  Are the voices of dominant student groups (white, able-bodied, neuro-typical, etc.) amplified over the voices of other students? What are we going to do about it? How might we employ the language of dance to engage more voices? How might we bring body equity to the discussion, welcoming the multilingual dance vocabularies that speak through difference, diversity, disability, and non-normative bodyminds (Rice, 2021)?

 Silence and Listening

 And what about silence? Hanna (2021) speaks to the ways in which silence is entangled with voice and urges us to consider the multiple ways that silence is used by teachers and students. For example, silence is often expected by teachers as a demonstration of respect and an indication of attentive learning. These assumptions may obscure a teacher’s understanding of a student’s silence. Perhaps the student employs silence for self-protection if the classroom environment causes harm, perhaps to subvert a teacher’s misuse of power, or perhaps to claim a different space for learning and thinking and being (2021).  

I believe dance has the potential to activate this different space, this silent space, for embodied learning and thinking and listening and being. In this space silence is valued. In this space we can engage in what Bassell refers to as “the politics of listening” (2017, p.1) where listening is given as much space as voicing.  Bassell construes listening as a social and political practice, wherein speakers are called upon to do more listening, and listeners are invited to do more speaking. In our dance spaces, this translates to privileging the voice of the body over speaking. It demands quiet listening and reading of the meaning conveyed by the body. In this way I submit that listening is also an artistic practice, that allows us to hear and understand ourselves and each other more intimately. I further propose that dance is a social and political practice that can serve to amplify marginalized voices and bodies in ways that assert presence and command listening and attention. 

The secondary and post-secondary student performances included in this issue of Provocations, are powerful demonstrations of social, political, artistic practice. The dancer’s physical voices speak loud and clear and demand to be heard. But how might  a generalist elementary teacher begin to introduce dance as a language? In practical, concrete terms, how does one teach students to speak and listen and think with the body? What follows is a description of one approach, followed by a brief outline of a structured learning experience for students. 

Teaching Dance as a Language

A dance workshop can be structured very much like a process writing workshop. The Ontario Language Curriculum, Grades 1-8, outlines the specific language conventions of spelling, grammar, punctuation, and style and states that “they should be developed, as much as possible, in the context of writing activities that are meaningful and creative and allow students to develop thinking skills that underlie clear writing” (1997, p. 13). A parallel statement can be made for dance. The dance elements of body, energy, relationship, space and time should be developed, as much as possible, in the context of dance activities that are meaningful and creative and allow students to develop thinking and moving skills that underlie clear and compelling dance.

Teachers know that the quality of writing composition is directly related to the breadth of a student’s vocabulary and their command of mechanics and conventions. Similarly, the quality of dance composition is related to the breadth of a student’s movement vocabulary and their command of the elements of dance. 

In our Language programs, we immerse our students in rich literature and engage them with wordplay to expand their vocabulary. We teach the mechanics of spelling, grammar and punctuation, and provide meaningful contexts within which to practise and apply these skills. The same principles apply to dance instruction. Immersion in dance experiences and movement play are foundational to the development and expansion of movement vocabulary. Posing movement challenges, (e.g. create a phrase that incorporates a slow turn, a quick collapse and a wide shape at a low level) teaches students how to construct and punctuate their movement phrases. Providing rich and meaningful contexts motivates them to apply these skills to communicate their intended meaning with clarity and precision. Choreographer Darcey Callison states that “movement is its own form of communication…If a person falls to the ground with their head down we know it means one thing. If a person falls to the ground looking up to the heavens we know it means another thing. How this movement is executed is of great import” (cited in Saxton, 2001, pp. 21-22). This is a fundamental concept for our student dancers; they learn this through both seeing and building dance.  This drive to communicate leads our students through the creative process, and encourages them to revise and refine their dance compositions. The role of the teacher is to provide structures that move students comfortably into the realm of aesthetic and symbolic representation, using dance structures and devices to shape meaning. There must also be meaning and relevance to the work; a reason to engage. Teachers often turn toward literature- stories, poetry, student writing – to generate purpose and fuel a drive to make meaning. 

If we want students to think in an embodied way; to reveal themselves and voice their thoughts, feelings and ideas through dance, we must establish a climate where they can be courageous. Once students have experienced the power of their physical voices and the impact of their creative expressions on their peers, their courage grows. They use the language of dance with growing fluency, drawing upon a broader range of sign/symbol systems to transmit meaning. This statement by Jeanette Winterson (1995) has long stayed with me: “The processes of art are like a series of jolts or perhaps volts, for art is an extraordinarily faithful transmitter. Our job is to keep our receiving equipment in good order”(p.13). 

The processes outlined in the Arts curriculum align beautifully with Winterson’s metaphor: the creative process is designed to help students develop their transmitting capacities and the critical analysis process is designed to help students hone their receiving capacity through viewing and interpreting a broad spectrum of dance (both peer-created and professional choreography). These processes also cohere with the writing process as outlined in the Language curriculum, which allows for a seamless integration of dance and language curriculum expectations, as detailed in the learning experiences mapped below. 

Teaching dance as a language makes dance accessible to both students and teachers. It provides students with another voice - a physical voice- with which to assert their presence in the world. It honours diverse ways of knowing and being. A dance-rich program does not privilege reading and writing over other forms of literacy.  Students learn to give voice to their thoughts, feelings and ideas through the language of dance; they learn to listen, beyond the verbal and written voice (Hanna, p. 168), to what is being said through dance and they learn to read the language of dance, making meaning in new ways. A classroom community grows closer through the language of dance, becoming more attentive and attuned to each other (Hanna, p. 168). Students grow in their understanding of self, one another, and the world.  For these reasons, I believe dance is a gift to both students and teachers. I encourage all teachers to cultivate relationships with dance artists, take a dance course if you can, carve out time and space for dance, and begin to experiment with the power and joy of dance. If you love teaching language, you may just love teaching dance!

See  Appendix A  for a sample approach to teaching dance as a language. It aligns Day 1 Language activities with Day 2 Dance activities, illustrating clear connections between language and dance learning. This is followed by a teaching story that outlines some integrated drama and dance extensions. Please feel free to use and/or adapt to the needs and interests of your students.

References

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