Somatic Foundations in Higher Education

Supervisor: Professor Sheryl Saterstrom of St. Olaf College Dance Department

Student Researchers: Betsy Gaasedelen ’13, Kathleen Pender ’13, and Aleks Weaver ’12.

Introduction

At St. Olaf College in Northfield, MN an ongoing research project is currently in progress funded by a grant from the St. Olaf College CURI program- Collaborative Undergraduate Research and Inquiry. The first stage of this project ran nine weeks from June 6th to August 5th, 2011. The process of this project was re-invented on a daily basis as the project and information gathered adopted a bodymindspirit of its own and directed its own path.

Process

The initial research was fueled by the desire to survey dance programs in colleges and universities across the country in which a range of approaches to somatic education is meaningfully integrated into dance technique classes.  A survey was devised using SurveyMonkey and sent out to NDEO (National Dance Education Organization), individuals in the field of somatics in dance education, and colleges and universities with dance programs. The survey sent out asked the following three questions:

1. Definition: How do you define somatics and/or somatic education?

2. Rationale: Why do you have an attention to somatics in your program? How long has somatics been a part of your program?

3. Implementation: If applicable to your educational institution, what dance classes are offered that you consider to be somatic-based? What is the relationship between somatics-based classes and other technique and theory classes in your program? How is a somatic approach integrated into your program’s values for dance training?

Results

Through the survey responses and conversations with dance professors and leaders in the somatic field, we noticed similar language and concepts kept popping up.  We distilled these simple words, phrases, and ideas and formed a comprehensive list of this recurrent language.

Based on the survey responses, we found these following somatic principles to be recurrent.

  1. An emphasis on integrating the body-mind connection
  2. Expanding awareness and opening up the possibilities of perception
  3. Focus on the individual’s personal experience through his/her own first-person sensing

Conclusions

We found an enormous range of integration of somatic education in dance programs around the country. This range included yoga classes, exercises integrated in technique classes, sets of somatic classes as in a sequential track, and entire programs organized around a somatic intention. Given this range, we sensed a desire for a better understanding of the place for somatics in dance education. Much time will pass before any standard for somatic integration in higher education is developed, however we began by forming a preliminary definition for Somatics, based on the language we observed in the survey responses, and created this website as a place where interested people can come to learn about and discuss this evolving field.

In phase two of this long-term project we intend to investigate somatic understandings across domains other than dance, reconnect with the survey participants from the 2011 study, and continue to develop this website towards a more interactive and accessible forum that reflects it’s somatic content. This work will continue to be overseen by Professor Sheryl Saterstrom of the St. Olaf College Dance Department and will include Julia Moser-Hardy ’14 as an additional student researcher.

Want to know more about our process? You can contact us via e-mail at simplysomatic@gmail.com.