Reflections of Embodiment and Enaction Theories on Contemporary Theater Practices: Somatic Approach in Acting Training
Bilge Serdar GöksülükIn the 21st century, enaction theories that have emerged as a result of the intersection of neuroscience, cognitive science, and phenomenology have changed our understanding of cognitive processes, such as imagination, perception, feeling, emotion, and thought, which are directly related to theater and performing arts. In enaction theories, the emphasis on bodily action in the process of providing meaning makes one’s primary movement experience a key concept. The study thus traces such theoretical shift in theater and performing arts and discusses the concept of embodied consciousness that expectedly occurs during the performance. Furthermore, based on embodiment theories, the study elucidates how somatic practices provide an embodied experience that facilitates performative awareness and how such practices contribute to actor training. Briefly, the main objectives of this study are to highlight possible discussions and emphasize the contribution of somatic practices in actor training based on embodied theories.
Bedenleşme ve Enaksiyon Teorilerinin Çağdaş Tiyatro Uygulamalarına Yansımaları: Oyunculuk Eğitiminde Somatik Yaklaşım
Bilge Serdar GöksülükYirmi birinci yüzyılda bilişsel bilimler, sinirbilimleri ve fenomenolojinin ortaklığında gelişen enaksiyon teorileri, doğrudan tiyatro ve performans sanatları alanına giren imgelem, algı, duygu, his ve düşünce gibi bilişsel süreçlere ilişkin kavrayışımızı değiştirir. Enaksiyon teorileriyle anlamlandırma süreçlerinde bedensel eylemliliğe yapılan vurgu, kişinin birincil hareket deneyimini anahtar kavram haline getirir. Bu çalışmada da tiyatro ve performans alanında bu kavrayış değişikliğinin izi teorik olarak sürülerek, bedenleşmiş bilinç kavramı tartışmaya açılır. Bu bağlamda hareket deneyimi üzerine öz-gözlemsel bir uygulama alanı olan somatik uygulamaların bedenleşmiş bir deneyimi nasıl sağladığı ve böylelikle oyunculuk eğitimine nasıl katkı sağlayabileceği üzerinde durulur. Özetle, bu makalenin temel amacı bedenleşme teorilerinden kısaca bahsederek olası tartışma alanlarına işaret etmek ve somatik uygulamaların oyunculuk eğitimine nasıl katkı sunabileceğini tartışmaktır.
Embodiment suggests that one’s experience of the world is a result of the interaction between one’s bodily qualities and their environment (social, cultural, economic, and natural conditions). Therefore, cognitive processes, such as meaning, imagination, thought, and language, which are abstract concepts, cannot be separately understood from bodily experience and metaphysical qualities; however, they are considered as results of one’s changing activities, which are dependent on their environmental conditions. Accordingly, various theories, such as embodied mind, meaning, and reality, have emerged. Moreover, the enaction theory focuses on the interaction between perception and action, which includes embodied theories, and emphasizes that one’s mutual interaction with their environment occurs through one’s agency. In this sense, the concept of enactive embodiment expands the limit of the word embodiment, which is usually discussed in terms of the tension between the actor’s own body and the character in theater and performing arts. In enactive theories, “action” becomes the activating force of consciousness and “movement” becomes the constitutive element of meaning. This aspect reveals the subconscious bodily foundations of meaning apart from linguistics. The purposes of this study are to highlight such shift in bodily phenomena and discuss the need for a somatic approach in actor training.
In terms of actor training, the most crucial aspect of scientific discourse is to emphasize that a well-directed self-reflection on one’s personal experience of movement plays an essential role in developing rich insight about others, increasing empathy skills, and strengthening intuitions. Hence, in the context of theater and performing arts education, a phenomenological self-reflective monitoring of one’s personal experience is the way through which the experience can be opened as a learning space wherein senses can be refined, new questions and answers emerge, and any technique can be personalized, which corresponds to a “conscious experience.” Thus, conscious experience should be understood as a state of being and not as a state of continuous questioning.
Movement means that the moving person can visually or tactically perceive and can kinesthetically feel their own movements; in other words, movement is treated as a field of discovery wherein one can directly experience the “internal” and “external” realms through their own movements. In addition, somatic practices are widely spreading in art education worldwide in recent years. They offer the actor an opportunity to practice a phenomenology of movement. This characteristic of somatic practices differs from the investigation of different forms and situations of the phenomenon using the imagination that is observed in Husserl’s eidetic variation. In phenomenological study through the execution of movement, one may discover the relationship between the function and expressiveness of one’s own movements through one’s intention. This aspect indicates that during the execution of movement, as the intention changes (the intention may focus on effort, the shape of the body, a point in space, power, etc.), one realizes the changes depending on the changed intention. During all these activities, the body’s scheme is examined through developmental movement patterns, and as a result, a body image is developed. Accordingly, somatic studies improve reflective and pre-reflective bodily consciousness by developing the senses of proprioception, kinesthesia, and interoception. Therefore, somatic movement practices help performers to exhibit a truly embodied acting on stage and achieve performative awareness, that is, a special heightened state of consciousness that occurs in the performance of actors, such as dancers, athletes, or musicians.
Somatic practices pertain to training the behavioral sensory and perceptual sensitivity. The actor gets an embodied experience through somatic practices by discovering the connection between action and intention, physical and emotional states, and function and expression through their own experience. Such an experience constitutes the first step of embodied acting on stage. Therefore, this study highlights the need for a somatic approach as a base of actor training to facilitate the understanding of embodied theories from a scientific perspective.
