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Moving Bodies in Interaction – Interacting Bodies in Motion: Intercorporeality, interkinesthesia, and enaction in sports
Edited by Christian Meyer and Ulrich v. Wedelstaedt
[Advances in Interaction Studies 8] 2017
► pp. 301–322

Chapter 12
Ways of relating

Involvements of bodies in ballet class

Participants of ballet classes relate to each other in various ways. Four practices are scrutinized here in particular – molding, mirroring, spacing and presenting. Through these, balletic bodies are fabricated. In each of these contexts, the relevant activities are distributed across several participants, and human bodies take part as very different “participation units” such as collaborating muscles and hands or visually connected movement displays. Drawing on ethnographic data, I argue that in order to understand what goes on “between” bodies, one must explore the practice-specific and situational ways of relating and the specific according involvements of bodies as parts of material culture.

Keywords: ballet, body, practice theory, ethnography, practicing, involvement, interaction
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Enacting ballet bodies
  • 3.The setting of ballet class
  • 4.Practices of relating
    • 4.1Molding
    • 4.2Mirroring
    • 4.3Spacing
    • 4.4Presenting
  • 5.Conclusion
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 14 August 2017
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/ais.8.12mul
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