Concept

In a highly innovative and experimental approach, UBC, SFU and external scholars from Canada, USA, Germany and Japan, as well as UBC and SFU graduate students and performers came together for discussions and performances with the aim of exploring and possibly bridging the multiple gaps that exist between discipline-centered theories of the body and the various practises of diverse cultural body images in literature, theatre, dance, and the visual arts.

The interdisciplinary workshop examined emerging theories of choreography, performativity, theatrality, and corporeality within an open-disciplinary, transcultural frame (e.g., corporeal topographies, dance as anthropology, social choreographies, urban and gendered spaces, body modifications in technological, textual, and performative spaces).

The core participants' fields of interest stem from diverse disciplines such as

Asian Studies
Computing Science
Dance Studies
European Studies (Austrian, German, French and Polish Studies)
Gender Studies
Human Kinetics
Music
Theatre Studies
Visual Art

Their research ranges from autonomous robots, cyberglove controlled speech synthesis, body art and modification, viewpoints improvisation technique, Laban's choreography, social choreographies, dance as anthropology, gender in Japanese theatre, to body images in medieval and 19th to 21st century European literature and culture. All participants share a common interest in exploring the human body – its physical movements as well as its malleable images within the intersection of social, cultural and performative spaces – as corporeal topographies.

Research Goal and Objective