Diasporic Movement Practice Series
With Lela Aisha Jones
Wednesdays 9/21, 10/19, 11/16 10am-12pm
Photo by Aidan Un
Diasporic Movement Practice (DMP): Taught by Lela Aisha Jones (and many before and after her), DMP's are contemporary movement practices grounded in dance cultures and traditions of African and Black peoples. Lela's strongest foundations in her diasporic movement practice are dances common in southern United States (primarily Florida), Guinea, Ghana, Guinea Bissau, and northeastern Brazil (primarily Salvador, Bahia). She also brings to her teaching a wide range of gestural, socially conscious, spiritual, modern dance, and improvisational tools and inspirations.
September - DMP | Physicalities Realities: We will investigate how diasporic dances meet our bodies in fresh ways as well as multiple entry points for engaging with, understanding, and embodying movement culture that is with us everyday in our U.S. lived experience. The Black/African diasporic presence in our bodies seems to be continuously (even conveniently) elusive remaining unnamed and unframed in many spaces of privilege. We will awake what is unconscious in our bodies from diaspora. We will honor what cannot be proven. We will go back to the beginning of our bodies engaging with diasporic culture. We will start over and be honest. We will reopen this process.
October - DMP | Diaspora Unbound is a journey into the creative potential of the spiritual, conceptual, and physical energies that exist in movement of African descent and cultures of Black peoples. Itoffers poly-sensing as an addition to the already well established poly-rhythmic approaches to movement that are vibrant and alive within diasporic movement cultures. Expect a class or workshop that provides exhilarating body discoveries with unexpected physical explosion and intricate narratives. In this class you will experience physicalities derived from movement practices in the U.S. and the broader diasporic experience.
November - DMP | Merges Diverges (Swing, Drop, Two Step, Triplets, Bounce): Movement styles of diasporic lineage collide and converge as Lela Aisha Jones has discovered in her experience, embodiment, research, and artistic migrations through African descendant traditions and cultures of Black peoples. In this session let your body defy time and fall into the depth of complexity. Expect to experience time lapse conversions of moving bodies over generations, such as the city boy slide (from the 1990s Florida-dirty-dirty-teen-club-life) as akin to KuKu/KouKou (a long lineaged Guinean dance). Also expect to embody physicalities that make these dances so importantly their own creation and from their own time.
Diasporic Movement Practice Series
from $20.00
with Lela Aisha Jones
Wednesday's 9/21, 10/19, and 11/16 10am-12pm
$50 whole series/$20 per class
The Whole Shebang
1813 S. 11th Street
Philadelphia, Pa
