Gestalt qualities at the interface of embodied learning and speech

General aims. The cognitive ethnography of Tango Argentino classes aims to explicate principles of learners` situated use of gestalt imagery in improvisational body techniques with partner-interaction (a second optional field like contact improvisation is envisaged). Imagery-based processes in embodied consciousness are reconstructed through a method mix. It includes participant observation in dance classes (i.e. an ethnographic method), post-class interview data (i.e. the linguistic analysis of metaphors and related data in speech and gesture), and video analysis (i.e the coding of movement style of short video slices.). Theory. To connect these three methods a cognitive theory of cross-modal, embodied gestalts called image schemas (IS; Johnson 1987, Hampe 2005, Pecher & Zwaan 2005, Gibbs 2005) is applied and expanded. IS such as BALANCE, LINK, CONTAINER, PATH, CYCLE, UP-DOWN, FRONT-BACK, PART-WHOLE, FORCE, CENTER-PERIPHERY, or CONTACT are dynamic structuring principles that underlie speech, gesture, and, so I will claim, full-body motion. While it is known that imagery in dance underlies motor perception, planning, inner rehearsal and execution (Jola & Mast 2005), and that experts use conscious imagery and metaphor (Hanrahan & Vergeer 2001, Gugutzer 2002), my aim is to elaborate a theory of the function and scope of dynamic IS in situated cognition/learning. Pilots in the Tango scene indicate that IS can be distilled from talk about movement, spatial and kinesthetic perception, inner body processes, other bodies, and emotions. How dyads of dancers (or triads with a teacher) functionally organize the dynamic interplay between linguistic and enacted imagery needs to be studied empirically. Hypotheses. Dance skill acqusition may involve dynamic image-schematic structuring in: (1) developing motor and perceptual skills (including proprioception, alteroception and orientation), (2) creating a shared action system - and by implication a partly shared cognitive system - with a partner, (3) communicating through language and gesture with teachers or partners about their bodily experience, and (4) in other contexts when acquired skills spill- over to everyday empathy skills, perceptual refinement or a sense of bodily comportment. Methods. Crucially, IS theory allows making different data commensurable. The task is to identify gestalt parameters on dance videos and to relate them to schemas found by cognitive linguistic methods in interview videos: IS underlie talk about dance itself and inhere in some accompanying gestures. However, IS also underlie motor execution itself and may thus be amenable to visual analysis. For demonstrating the latter point, the Kestenberg Movement Profile (Sossin & Kestenberg-Amighi 1999), a Laban-derived coding system, is used. It targets the subtle manner of movement and rhythmic variation that verbal reports may miss, while also providing further support for gestalt parameters in linguistic data. These converging methods allow addressing whether there are strong subjective phenomenological correlates of visible movement qualities in dance. (One major focus here is whether mutually attuned movement rhythm can predict the experience of harmony between partners.) Other questions are addressed by contrasting participants` perspectives, e.g. when teachers use a body-related image that is gradually projected into and then appropriated into a student`s body schema.

General aims. The cognitive ethnography of Tango Argentino classes aims to explicate principles of learners` situated use of gestalt imagery in improvisational body techniques with partner-interaction (a second optional field like contact improvisation is envisaged). Imagery-based processes in embodied consciousness are reconstructed through a method mix. It includes participant observation in dance classes (i.e. an ethnographic method), post- class interview data (i.e. the linguistic analysis of metaphors and related data in speech and gesture), and video analysis (i.e the coding of movement style of short video slices.). Theory. To connect these three methods a cognitive theory of cross-modal, embodied gestalts called image schemas (IS; Johnson 1987, Hampe 2005, Pecher & Zwaan 2005, Gibbs 2005) is applied and expanded. IS such as BALANCE, LINK, CONTAINER, PATH, CYCLE, UP-DOWN, FRONT-BACK, PART-WHOLE, FORCE, CENTER-PERIPHERY, or CONTACT are dynamic structuring principles that underlie speech, gesture, and, so I will claim, full-body motion. While it is known that imagery in dance underlies motor perception, planning, inner rehearsal and execution (Jola & Mast 2005), and that experts use conscious imagery and metaphor (Hanrahan & Vergeer 2001, Gugutzer 2002), my aim is to elaborate a theory of the function and scope of dynamic IS in situated cognition/learning. Pilots in the Tango scene indicate that IS can be distilled from talk about movement, spatial and kinesthetic perception, inner body processes, other bodies, and emotions. How dyads of dancers (or triads with a teacher) functionally organize the dynamic interplay between linguistic and enacted imagery needs to be studied empirically. Hypotheses. Dance skill acqusition may involve dynamic image-schematic structuring in: (1) developing motor and perceptual skills (including proprioception, alteroception and orientation), (2) creating a shared action system - and by implication a partly shared cognitive system - with a partner, (3) communicating through language and gesture with teachers or partners about their bodily experience, and (4) in other contexts when acquired skills spill- over to everyday empathy skills, perceptual refinement or a sense of bodily comportment. Methods. Crucially, IS theory allows making different data commensurable. The task is to identify gestalt parameters on dance videos and to relate them to schemas found by cognitive linguistic methods in interview videos: IS underlie talk about dance itself and inhere in some accompanying gestures. However, IS also underlie motor execution itself and may thus be amenable to visual analysis. For demonstrating the latter point, the Kestenberg Movement Profile (Sossin & Kestenberg-Amighi 1999), a Laban-derived coding system, is used. It targets the subtle manner of movement and rhythmic variation that verbal reports may miss, while also providing further support for gestalt parameters in linguistic data. These converging methods allow addressing whether there are strong subjective phenomenological correlates of visible movement qualities in dance. (One major focus here is whether mutually attuned movement rhythm can predict the experience of harmony between partners.) Other questions are addressed by contrasting participants` perspectives, e.g. when teachers use a body-related image that is gradually projected into and then appropriated into a student`s body schema.