Touch in Contact Improvisation: proximity/distance under intimate circumstances

Vionnet, Claire (2021). Touch in Contact Improvisation: proximity/distance under intimate circumstances. The Senses and Society, 16(3), pp. 320-338. Taylor & Francis 10.1080/17458927.2021.1982000

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This article investigates the experience of touch within the dance practice of Contact Improvisation. Drawing on eight months of ethnographic fieldwork in Montreal, the author explores the conventions/taboos regulating touch and the redefinition of intimate boundaries under circumstances of close proximity. The emergence of Contact Improvisation in the 1970s as a “touch revolution” is compared with today’s politics of touch – strongly impacted by #MeToo – to understand dancers’ oscillation between attraction and fear. Based on ethnographic and autoethnographic research, this article highlights aspects of the mindful body, such as the interrelatedness between touch, weight, movement and intention. Drawing on skin studies, it unravels how tactile communication encompasses information about kinesthesia, orientation, grounding, and weight, and proposes a novel take on the relationship between physical proximity and emotional intimacy.

Item Type:

Journal Article (Original Article)

Division/Institute:

06 Faculty of Humanities > Other Institutions > Walter Benjamin Kolleg (WBKolleg) > Interdisciplinary Research and Graduate Network (IRN)

UniBE Contributor:

Vionnet, Claire

Subjects:

300 Social sciences, sociology & anthropology

ISSN:

1745-8935

Publisher:

Taylor & Francis

Funders:

[4] Swiss National Science Foundation

Projects:

Projects 0 not found.

Language:

English

Submitter:

Claire Vionnet

Date Deposited:

12 Dec 2022 15:25

Last Modified:

12 Dec 2022 18:38

Publisher DOI:

10.1080/17458927.2021.1982000

Uncontrolled Keywords:

Autoethnography – Contact Improvisation – Intimacy – Skin – Touch

BORIS DOI:

10.48350/174978

URI:

https://boris.unibe.ch/id/eprint/174978

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