Keynote by Dr Thomas F. DeFrantz

We are so excited to have Dr. Thomas F. DeFrantz giving the Keynote at our symposium on Friday...

Queering the Somatic: Interrupting the Narrative 

Dr DeFrantz will be speaking from 1-2pm (UK time)

If you would like to hear him please comment below and we will make a Skype group to call you in as we live stream the presentation to you...

Student Voice for the MAPP courses

Please consider being a student leader by being one of the Student Voice Leaders for MAPP. This means consulting with other people on the programme and feedback string points and things that have developed and things that still need development.

https://www.mdxsu.com/studentvoiceleaders

If you become a Student Voice Leader you get some leadership training from the Student Union and of course you can admit to your CV as a responsibility you took on.

Student Voice Meeting where you feedback to the University is the week of February17th 2020 (so if you are Module Three it might not be for you as you might have graduated by February)

Please comment below

Re:Generations - Dance and Digital space...reminder

Try and attend there will workshops, papers and performances:
https://www.onedanceuk.org/event/regenerations-2019/

In my language - Amanda Baggs

I was in a discussion about improvisation this week and this video was shared.

Critical Thinking as creative process

This blog is about Critical Thinking – not being critical (being judgemental) when you are thinking, but thinking critically (being analytical). For me critical thinking is about asking questions about the things we take for granted: asking about the things we see as ‘normal’ t. These are things that because of our culture, or society we take as ‘just being’ (not noticeable). Critical Thinking asks us to notice/take the position that this is a perspective: if we lived at a different time or place or culture these ‘normal’ things would be noticeable (not normal). 

In this lecture Sir Ken Robinson reconsiders 'school'. The perspective that 'education' or 'academia' is something separate from the arts (which are lesser value!) is something even those in the Arts might have picked up through social and cultural contact with the wider community. How have you positioned your own knowledge(s) gained from your artistic practice. What resonates with you from this lecture? What surprises you? is there some thing Sir Ken Robinson talks about that you feel he articulates really well - something you've thought but haven't put words to? 
Please comment below...

Wednesday Oct 16th: Online Skype session with DAN4630 Module Two focus

Wednesday Oct 16^th 2019: Online Skype session with DAN4630 Module Two focus

8pm (time in London)

Please comment below if you are going attend, please also include your thoughts on the topics in the Module or current research /reflection you are doing. This is so people can prepare before the conversation by look at and researching each other’s ideas and reflections.

Re:Generations Conference in Manchester: Dance and Digital Space - one month away!!

Thursday 7^thto Saturday 9^th  at the Lowry Manchester, UK

Conference Re:Generations 

Workshops, discussion & performances.

Come along if you are in North of UK next month. BAPP and MAPP Alumni will be presenting work. Come along and support and exchange ideas. 

Hosted in partnership by One Dance UK, IRIE! dance theatre, Middlesex University, Dance Immersion, Canada and The Lowry, the theme for Re:generations 2019 is dance and the digital space. We will explore the ways digital technologies can be used for artistic innovation and creative practise, unite global communities through online platforms whilst increasing the visibility of diverse work to mainstream audiences.

Across the three days there will be panel discussions, lecture demonstrations, masterclasses, workshops, academic paper presentations, performances, networking events and more!

Get tickets here: 
https://www.onedanceuk.org/programme/dance-of-the-african-diaspora/building-global-networks/regenerations-international-conference/

Skype Sunday Discussion group October 13th

Sunday Oct 13^th2019 : MAPP discussion group 

8pm (time in London)

Topic: theory and frameworks.

Please comment below if you are going attend, please also include your thoughts on the topic or current research /reflection you are doing. This is so people can prepare before the conversation by look at and researching each other’s ideas and reflections.

Monday Module One focus AOLs

In this discussion we talked about AOLs. Apart grom the claim of prior learning thatvthey make to the University why have them along side Module One? We talked about how they help us unpack our current practice by looking at the skills and knowledge the experience of our careers has given us. How this influences ‘how’ we practice. So practice is not a job title “I am a dance teacher” or  “I am a singer in the West End” but about how we do these things. We look atvthis in terms of threads that run throught the tjingscwe do (even ones not obviously associated with our profession practice). These threads are where our life learning mamifests. We also spoke sbout the confidence to claim your learning and also the confidence recognising it and linking it to wider feilds gives you. 

Those in the conversations are posting thoughts and links to further pists in the comments below. What fo you feel?... please comment below. 

Queering the Somatic: Interrupting the Narrative - one month away!

Friday Nov 1st & Saturday Nov  2nd  (at Middlesex University, Hendon London UK)

Helen and I are curating the Symposium 'Queering the Somatic: interrupting the narrative.' 

There will be workshops and discussion, some MAPP and BAPP alumni will be presenting work - come along and support them if you are near London (or make a trip to attend). 

Queering the Somatic: Interrupting the Narrative Symposium 1^st and 2^ndNovember 2019. Dance can be seen as a critical way of being in the world. For us dance emphasises the felt over the ‘named’, dispelling binaries and challenging Western constructs of the passive body. Queer theory is a field of critical thinking emerging in the early 1990’s drawing on feminism and queer studies to challenge social constructs and identities. Moving beyond the social constructs of the body both dance and queer theory offer a fluidity for narrating the lived experience; narrations that interrupt dominant stories of identity and how we move through the world.

Queering the somatic offers opportunities to explore, challenge and celebrate the act of dispelling binaries: mind-body, male-female, subject-object. 

The symposium is looking for contributions that might re-imagine, re-educate, re-think, reveal and allow us to re-create a world without the limits of binaries that reflect the somatic experience of Being in the world. 

Queering the Somaticis the third somatic symposium curated by Dr Adesola Akinleye and Helen Kindred, following Wright-ing the Somatic(2016), 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5sh_fNd_jys&t=17s

and Narrating the Somatic(2018),

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_e1md6ejfK0

We hope; ‘Let’s imagine together we have all the money in the world and let’s let go of black and white, gay and straight, theory and practice and that all the gatekeepers have flung the doors open. Let’s focus on the arts, the practice and sharing. Understanding the world for a moment through someone else’s eyes’ (Akinleye, A. 2018)