Dance as Research
Name:Kexin Wang
Framing Statement
Human emotions come in many categories, including happiness, sadness, fear, missing, and so on. It can be said that the existence of these emotions affects people's social interaction, learning cognition, mental health and other aspects of life. Human emotions are expressed through a variety of channels, such as voice tone, facial expressions and body movements. Charles Darwin proposed that both humans and animals are capable of expressing emotions through motor behavior（Darwin,1872). As a non-verbal body art, dance is one of the most direct and oldest forms of cultural expression in terms of emotion.In the field of dance, there is always a popular "dance is better than lyric", indicating that there is a close relationship between dance and emotion.
Our art research practice discusses dance movement and emotion recognition. In many previous studies, I have seen a lot of articles about how dancers and dance movements express and convey emotions. This time, we will focus on the audience and movement emotions. Through the research, I want to know whether the audience can accurately identify the emotions that dancers want to convey from dance movements. There is a special part in our research, that is, we used the Chinese five-element theory to complete this art practice.
In traditional Chinese philosophy, there is the concept of the five elements theory. The five elements include metal, wood, water, fire and earth. These five elements are the basic elements closely related to human life that the ancient Chinese gradually deepened their understanding of nature. The five elements theory is a basic way of understanding the world and is applied in various fields in China, such as medicine, agriculture, astronomy, military and so on.
The five elements theory, each element has its own corresponding color, called the "five colors" : gold is white, wood is green, water is black, fire is red, and earth is yellow. At the same time, the five elements also have their own relative emotions: metal is sorrow, wood is angry, water is fear, fire is joy, earth is preoccupation. In this study, we want to deeply explore the relationship between emotions and dance movements, as well as the relationship between audience and dancers by integrating the five elements theory.
In this art practice, my partner and I play two roles, I am the audience and she is the performer. We do this in three parts. The first part is motion sensing and response. In this part, my partner as a dancer had to choose an element of the five elements without my knowledge and express the emotion corresponding to that element through dance movements in front of me. After watching my partner's performance as an audience, I also have to respond to the emotions I feel with dance movements, and also choose the emotional elements I feel in the five elements.The second part is drawing, which is an interesting part. We need to draw the feelings and situations brought by each other's dance movements. The third part is the interview. In the interview, we ask each other questions and tell our own ideas truthfully.
Through the study in these three ways, we found that we can identify emotions from dance movements, and dance emotions can be clearly felt through the dancer's movement texture, including speed, rhythm, and strength.In the part of dance movement sensing and response, I observed that my partner used a lot of contractile movements. For example, at the beginning, she sat on the ground with her head down and curled up, which made me feel the sadness conveyed by her and the dance movements. At the same time, by integrating the theory of the five elements of China, I also deeply felt the close connection between natural materials and human emotions.
In addition, through this research, I have a surprising discovery and idea. That is, this research and practice may be applied to the field of dance therapy. In China, there are now relevant studies on the treatment of the five elements of music, because in Chinese medicine, the five elements correspond to different five viscera: metal is the lung, wood is the liver, water is the kidney, fire is the heart, and earth is the spleen.
Five elements music treatment based on the pentatonic music, combined with the classification of the five elements of the human body, according to the physiological rhythm and characteristics of the five viscera to play music, thereby promoting the normal coordination of human viscera function and Qi and blood, to achieve physical and mental pleasure. According to relevant studies, dance plays a certain role in regulating people's emotions and promoting people's physical and mental health. Perhaps we can combine the theory of five elements with dance and apply it in the field of dance therapy to solve more people's mental and physical health problems, which will be a challenging and meaningful exploration.
Reference
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name:Daini Chen
In everyday life, individuals primarily utilise their physical gestures to convey their emotional states. Similarly, dance movements act as an outward manifestation of emotions, with the dancer's emotional condition being reflected through their body language and movement patterns. Studies [2] and [6] examined and classified the expression of emotions in dance, through the utilisation of the Laban Movement Analysis (LMA) and silhouette motion imaging (SMI) techniques, respectively. The researchers identified that grief performances had the highest recognition rate, followed by anger and joy. To comprehend why grief is recognised by dancers and accepted by audiences, I employ Chinese philosophical methods in my practice. This study thus explores dance emotions through the lens of dance movements.
My research is centred on the five elements of the ancient Chinese doctrine, examining the correlation between body movements and emotions and evaluating the audience's ability to recognise emotions conveyed by dancers. The five elements, constituting the fundamental components of the material universe, serve as a basis for my investigations. It corresponds to the human organs such as the liver, heart, spleen, lungs, and kidneys, as well as human emotions including rage, happiness, thinking, sadness, and fear. Additionally, it depicts five different colours: red, orange, yellow, green, and orange. One may conclude that it mirrors everything in nature and interconnects the body's five internal organs, which influence the external emotional changes reflected in colour.
The study selected improvised dance as a fundamental movement source, determined choices through lottery, and recognized suitable emotions through observation and imitation. Within the space, there were iron pots filled with "gold," branches to represent "wood," mineral water as "water," minerals symbolising "fire," burning candles to represent "fires," and clay as "ground." This setup helped participants to identify and experience emotions communicated through dance movements, which could potentially serve as one of their sources of material. Notably, there was only one individual in the room during the experiment. In this study, a participant is assigned to express emotions through dance, while another participant solely observes the following movements to identify the expressed emotion and give immediate feedback. Notably, both participants are both dancers and spectators. During the feedback's conclusive phase, interviews were conducted and coloured pencils were used to capture the observed emotions and images. Moreover, engaging in inter-study questioning, such as "What inspired your choice of the pot as the subject?" and "Which of my behaviours triggered your awareness of a feeling of sadness and how did your actions communicate this feedback to me?"
In a cross-cultural context, this study aims to utilise a Chinese philosophical methodology to explore the association between the body and emotions. Interculturality is a more flexible and transitory framework for relations between societies. It enables cultural observers to elucidate the interweaving, blending and permeability of cultures, promoting diversity rather than homogeneity. Dance is a vital means of intercultural expression, which can help us to comprehend how different cultures can combine and merge. Through practice, the abstract theory becomes concretized. This is because the doctrine of the five elements is an abstract concept that necessitates objective practice, applied to the emotional expression of dancers and other individuals. As the practice ended and deepened, I began to reflect on why I chose the "iron pot" to express sadness and why this emotion was more recognizable. My companion told me that she could intuitively recognize the emotion I was conveying when I made simple movements such as contracting, sinking, etc. So why is sadness easier to recognize? I have found that there are specific movements that make the dancer's emotions visually recognizable to the audience. For example, clenching the fists to show anger, raising the arms to show joy, etc. Meanwhile, in the case of an improvised dance, the emotional recognition of the dance is influenced by the three elements of time, space, and power, which consist of specific movements but with more emotional elements added, thus making it easier to be recognized. Historically, German Expressionist dances were usually twisted, curled up, and terrified to show various human pathos. Wegman's piece, Witch Dance, provoked me to think. What I know is that she was influenced by psychoanalysts Jung and Freud, which relate to concepts such as the human "subconscious." Watching her sinking body, constantly contracting, was accompanied by extremely dissonant percussion. The audience empathizes with her and easily recognizes her sadness. But if her limbs were up, light, jumping, etc., could they still go on to show the sadness she was conveying? And does the music of the dance also help the audience recognize the emotion? I think this is something I need to keep exploring and researching.
During my research, I considered the potential for the expressive nature of the body to be applied beyond the realm of dance. This led me to an interest in Dance Movement Therapy, which I discovered to be a form of psychotherapy that employs dance or improvisation to improve emotional and cognitive wellbeing, particularly for the elderly or disabled. Dance therapy addresses various aspects of the individual, including physical and emotional components. Marian Chace is credited with the founding of Dance therapy. Her approach to dance therapy relies on bodily action, symbolism, therapeutic movement relationships, rhythmic group activity, and dynamics. Additionally, she founded the American Dance Theatre Association. I aspire for my research and practice to further explore deeper angles of the field, to heighten patients' cognizance of themselves and others, nurture their creativity, promote proper body posture, and enhance their muscular strength by acknowledging the emotions expressed through body movement.
As a conclusion, in a cross-cultural context, my researcch attempting to establish a connection between the body and emotions using Chinese philosophy, individual emotions can be identified in dance movements. This prompts dancers and choreographers to consistently inquire about each individual's creative capabilities while creating and expressing artworks. Because it is impossible to create something that is not one's own, art is an extension of oneself. Dance movements are the external representation of emotion, which is the embodiment of a particular style. My intention is for my practice to not only aid dancers in recognizing the correlation and comprehension between the body and emotions, but also to be more accessible to the general public by allowing them to experience the strength of the body and its correlation with emotions.
references：
[1]Yuhan Lu. 2022. 《Analysis of Body and Emotion in Dance Performance》. Advances in social science, education and humanities research. doi: 10.2991/assehr.k.220205.008.
[2]Camurri, Antonio, Ingrid Lagerlöf和Gualtiero Volpe. 2003. 《Recognizing emotion from dance movement: comparison of spectator recognition and automated techniques》. International Journal of Human-computer Studies \/ International Journal of Man-machine Studies 59(1): 213–25.
[3]Hijikata, Yasuyo. 2012. 《Application of “Five Elements Theory” for Treating Diseases》. doi: 10.5772/27074.
[4]Rust-D’Eye, Anne D. 2013. 《The sounds of the self: Voice and emotion in dance/movement therapy》. Body, Movement and Dance in Psychotherapy 8(2):95–107. doi: 10.1080/17432979.2013.771702.
[5]Tang, Sook Kuan. 2012. 《Sumayau dance: Implications of dance movement therapy》.
[6]Wang, Simin, Junhuai Li, Ting Cao, Huaijun Wang, Pengjia Tu和Yue Li. 2020. 《Dance Emotion Recognition Based on Laban Motion Analysis Using Convolutional Neural Network and Long Short-Term Memory》. IEEE Access 8:124928–38. doi: 10.1109/access.2020.3007956.
[7]Bond, Lucy, and Jessica Rapson, eds. The transcultural turn: Interrogating memory between and beyond borders. Vol. 15. Walter de Gruyter, 2014.
[8]Welsch, Wolfgang. "Transculturality: The puzzling form of cultures today." Spaces of culture: City, nation, world 13.7 (1999): 194-213.
[9]Spies, Sarah. "Dance and the Body in Western Theatre, 1948 to the present." New Theatre Quarterly 33.2 (2017): 198.
[10]Fensham, Rachel, and Odette Kelada. "Dancing the Transcultural across the South." Journal of Intercultural Studies 33.4 (2012): 363-373.