Concept Spotlight: Developmental Movement
Every Alexander Technique teacher has a unique style of teaching, one that has grown up organically around their previous experiences with the Technique and with life in general. My teachers, Joan and Alex Murray, are a great example of this. Joan was a dancer with the royal ballet, and Alex was flautist with the london symphony. Joan’s teaching style is more dynamic and focuses more on movements into and out of various positions, while Alex’s is more poised and still, and focuses more on breathing and philosophy. One thing their teaching styles have in common, though, is the inclusion of concepts of developmental movement, influenced by the work of Australian anthropologist Raymond Dart.
Joan and Alex spent time working with Dart as he worked out his concepts of Developmental Movement, and seeing connections between his work and the work of Alexander, they began to incorporate the developmental movement procedures into their teaching. Developmental Movement work is the study of the natural ways that we learn to move as infants, from rolling over to crawling to standing and walking. The idea behind the pairing is that the way we learn to move naturally as babies is generally the most efficient way for our bodies to function, and re-learning these movements is therefore a good insight into increasing our standard of functioning. Dart invented a series of movements called the “Dart Procedures” that take a person from lying on the floor in a fetal position all the way to standing, using a series of motions that our bodies perform unconsciously as infants. These movements make use of the basic patterning systems of the body, from homologous (upper body vs. lower body) to homolateral (right side vs. left side) to contralateral (right arm to left leg and vice versa), in roughly the order that children discover them. The Murrays’ variation of Alexander Technique incorporates these patterning ideas, along with the concepts of primary and secondary curves combining to form spirals, to analyze everyday movements looking for ways to conceptualize them efficiently.
The concept of Developmental Movement can also be explored on an evolutionary scale, discussing the similarities between our movement and the movement of other primates. There is a plethora of information to be found within Dart’s work, so the next few Concept Spotlights will deal with some of the specific sub-concepts individually. Becky and Luc’s book, Dance and the Alexander Technique, also explores the Dart procedures in connection with the Alexander Technique as they relate to dance training and offers quite a bit of practical exploration on this topic. (Click the link above to go to my review of this book.)
Forward and Up! is a Pittsburgh-based private practice offering quality instruction in the Alexander Technique in a positive and supportive environment.
