پیشگام رقص حرکت درمانی در بریتانیا: نتایج تحقیقات روایت

This article reports research concerning life narratives of Dance Movement Therapy (DMT) pioneers in Britain. Nine pioneers were identified using a snowballing sampling technique. Participants were asked about the training and experiential influences on their career trajectory, first via a questionnaire. Each individual was then encouraged to narrate their story in their own way. Some did so in writing and others were interviewed by telephone. Validity of the narratives was enhanced by circulating the written account for comments, and by cross-checking references with each other within individual accounts. Narratives were analysed thematically, giving rise to the following categories: isolation; dance, affect and symbolisation; serendipity and choice; beginner's mind (a childlike attitude) and the search for theory. The following conclusions are made: the phenomenon of pioneering DMT in Britain was historically and culturally situated; career trajectories can be conceptualised as “falling forwards”; an attitude of exploration with tacit, embodied knowledge must be balanced alongside the thrust towards expertise and external evidence.

The creative arts therapies all have histories reaching back into the middle of the last century and beyond, yet little research has been carried out to systematically trace their development. Questions need to asked about what historical and cultural phenomena supported these developments, and how they have varied within the international arena. I first conceived of documenting the history of British Dance Movement Therapy (DMT) in 1990, when I was teaching DMT in Britain and wanted a context for my work. The research and reporting has been delayed several times for structural reasons. Fran Levy, in her book Dance Movement Therapy, A Healing Art (2005), provides a useful history of American DMT, chronicling the work of key American pioneers. I wanted to discover what made our approach uniquely British. I was curious to discover what, in our personal and collective history, had generated the phenomenon of British DMT. There has never before been any attempt to document the contribution of British pioneers of DMT via systematic research, although one useful anecdotal account exists, published since I began this research ( Meier, 1996). I decided to ask pioneers about their life stories in relation to the development of their identity as a Dance Movement Therapist and to analyse the narratives thematically. It is this analysis I offer here, together with some questions for further research. I will begin with a short early history of British DMT, to set into context the phenomenon of pioneering DMT as psychotherapy.1 I will then describe the methodology used for this research before offering a thematic analysis of the individual life narratives on which this research is based. I will reflect on these themes and on the historical context in which British DMT was able to flourish, before drawing conclusions concerning the historical situatedness of the development of DMT in Britain, the notion that career trajectories can be conceptualised as a kind of “falling forwards,” and the importance of balancing an attitude of naiveté together with tacit, embodied knowledge against contemporary imperatives to evidence the profession.