PARIP 2003

NATIONAL CONFERENCE: 11-14 September

CONTRIBUTORS

PAKES: ANNA
dance department
university of surrey, roehampton
practical embodied knowledge: the epistemology of dance practice as research

What kind of knowledge is embodied in choreography and dance performance? Is this knowledge distinctively practical as opposed to factual or theoretical? Yes, argue philosophers of dance education such as David Carr, who explores ideas about knowing how (as opposed to knowing that), practical reasoning and practical wisdom to elucidate dance knowledge’s distinctive character. From this perspective, the intelligence of performance and making are intrinsic to these actions themselves — not a function of a logically antecedent theoretical understanding “put into' practice. Such ideas support the contention of many practitioner-researchers that their work itself develops knowledge rather than physically demonstrating a pre-theorised intellectual position.

This paper explores the idea of practical knowledge in relation to dance practice as research. If dance generates primarily practical knowledge, then this is governed by a logic different from that which underpins its factual counterpart and which structures theoretical reasoning. This has implications, which the paper will consider, for what counts as a valid knowledge — or valid new knowledge, in the case of practice as research. What logic underpins choreographic and performance research? What counts as a valid contribution to practical understanding? The paper also examines whether the traditional requirements that research be both original and rigorous are still appropriate if the work generates practical rather than (straightforwardly or simply) factual or theoretical knowledge.

Anna Pakes is Lecturer in Dance at Roehampton University of Surrey, specialising in aesthetics and the philosophy of dance.

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