Substance dancer: Choreography, kinesthetic empathy, and substance use in the dance composition piece "Heal"

Authors: Olivia Okoniewski, Jonette Lancos

SUNY Campus: SUNY Geneseo

Presentation Type: Oral

Location: UUW 325

Presentation #: 8

Timeslot: Session D 3:00-4:00 PM

Abstract: This creative proposal asks after the relationship between choreography and audience as well as the potential for dance movement to engender understanding and empathy for the members of stigmatized groups, particularly, people who misuse substances. I am drawn to these issues as a choreographer, dancer, and teacher as well as being a family member to someone who identifies as an alcoholic. Just as I have wavered between empathy for and condemnation of this disease, my original tap-contemporary dance composition piece titled Heal invites audiences to grapple with their own judgments of self and others. Heal explores the complexities of substance use through Doris Humphrey’s (1959) quadripartite method: design (repetition of tap sounds and gestures); rhythm (motor, breath, and emotional); motivation (trembling hands); and dynamics (a mix of smooth and sharp movements). According to The National Institute of Drug Use (2023), stigmas of drug use carry widespread and damaging effects and we should switch to more affirming “person-centered language.” I am interested in exploring that “person-centered” shift in the realm of movement by exploring the joys and sorrows of the “substance-dancer” in the composition. My aim is to effect, through choreography and performance, what Reason & Reynolds (2010) describe as “kinesthetic empathy,” or the way in which the audience is invited to vicariously participate in a dancer’s movement, thereby engendering stronger emotional connections to the dancer, the dance, and the story they tell.