PEDAGOGY OF LIVING AND FEELING. THE EDUCATIONAL ACTION OF BODY-THEATRE

Abstract

This article contributes to the reflection on the body as an active and living subject of theatrical and paratheatrical practice, as observed in the pedagogical research of ‘embodied education’. Educational experience, rooted in aesthetic and performative action, is nourished by Dewey's theory of experience (1934, 1938), thereby bringing unity to educational and aesthetic experience. If experience can generally be said to relate to the reciprocal interaction of the individual with nature, punctuated by the rhythm of life itself - the heart beating, the flowing of the tides, the cycle of the seasons – then in the laboratory practice under investigation in this article, 'exercise' and thus aesthetic and performative practice can be considered to assume the form of  “body-theatre” (Corps-théâtre, Nancy, 2010). Embedded in its potential for experiential knowledge, as awakened through memory and listening, the body becomes the agent of a transformative action towards the unfolding of an encounter with both the self and the other.