IMITATION, IMITATION, EMPATHY EMPATHY AND DANCEAND DANCE

Helsinki, March 20, 2010Petri HoppuProject Dance in Nordic SpacesDepartment of Music AnthropologyUniversity of Tampere

Dancing with the others: Dancing with the others: social dancingsocial dancing Couple dances

Group dances

How does one learn to How does one learn to dance?dance?others on the dance floor

◦ dancing together, dancing similarly◦ collectivity vs. individual virtuosity (see

Bollen 2001 & Anttila 2007)learning social dances – learning what

others are doing, learning from others➵imitating other dancers (active)➵letting other people move oneself (passive)

learning means transmission of movements, body attitudes, structures and style from one dancer or dancers to another◦ constant process in social dancing

A case: A case: Learning the MinuetLearning the Minuet

Dancers from the Swedish-speaking West Coast

A case:A case:Learning the MinuetLearning the Minuet

orientation in two directions in longways formation: partner (opposite

sex)line (same sex)

music as a cohesive element◦ music as experienced◦ structural frame for

dancing

A case:A case:Learning the MinuetLearning the Minuet

sources for imitative learning:◦seeing others’ movements (quality and

articulation of steps in relation to rhythm, movements of hands and torso) and body attitude

◦hearing clapping, stamping and other sounds of feet

➵kinaesthetic experience: experience of others’ dance

➵resulting action: imitation / trying out the Minuet

From imitation to From imitation to empathyempathyImitation in dance:

◦self-other –relation◦mode of intersubjectivity◦not only mechanical mirroring but

requires grasping foreign experience

➵empathy: experience of foreign consciousness in general (Stein 1989)

Between and beyond self Between and beyond self and otherand otherEmpathy creates a fundamental relation

between self and other: they enact each other reciprocally through it (Thompson 2007)

self and other intertwine with each other as a dynamic system of reversibility (Merleau-Ponty 1968)◦ but they don’t merge to each other◦ empathy does not mean a total grasp of the

other’s feelings and emotions, but the other is experienced as another being like oneself through appreciation of similarity (Gallese 2001)

empathy acts as a foundation for inter-subjective experience and community (Stein 1989 & 2000)

Kinaesthetic empathyKinaesthetic empathyHow can one have kinaesthetic experience

from others’ dancing?kinaesthetic empathy (Parviainen 2006)

◦ following other people moving (e.g. dancing), we can get the feeling of the movement

individuals have different kinaesthetic experiences, knowledge and skills: their topography and kinaesthetic map of the body differ (Parviainen 2006)◦ the act of kinaesthetic empathy is different

depending on one’s topography and kinaesthetic map of the body, which entails that capability of imitation as well as learning to dance vary from one individual to another

Kinaesthetic empathyKinaesthetic empathykinaesthetic empathy is a matter of

experiencing other’s movements through similarities◦ the closer one’s kinaesthetic map is to the

other’s one, the easier it is to learn the dance➵cultural and social differences affect learning

This does not imply that some dances would be inaccessible for someone

☝ kinaesthetic maps can be changed and developed

In general, everyone has a potential to learn whatever dances

Anttila, Eeva 2007. Dance as a Dialogical Praxis: Challenging individualism in art and education. In Tidsskrift for dans i uddannelse vol. 1.

 Bollen, Jonathan 2001. Queer Kinesthesia. Performativity on the Dance Floor. In Dancing Desires. Choreographing Sexualities on & off the Stage. The University of Wisconsin Press.

 Gallese, Vittorio 2001. The ‘Shared Manifold’ Hypothesis: From Mirror Neurons to Empathy. In Between Ourselves. Second-person issues in the study of consciousness. Ed. by Evan Thompson. Exeter: Imprint Academic.

Merleau-Ponty, Maurice 1968. The Visible and the Invisible. [Le Visible et l’invisible 1964.] Northwestern University Press.

Parviainen, Jaana 2006. Meduusan like. Mobiiliajan tiedonmuodostuksen filosofiaa. Helsinki: Gaudeamus.

Stein, Edith 1989. On the Problem of Empathy. [Zum Problem der Einfühlung 1916.] Washington, D.C.: ISC Publications.

Stein, Edith 2000. Philosophy of Psychology and the Humanities. [Beiträge zur philosophischen Begründung der Psychologie und der Geistenwissenschaften 1922.] Washington, D.C.: ISC Publications.

Thompson, Evan 2007. Mind in Life: Biology, phenomenology, and the science of mind. Cambridge: Belknap Press.