Why should we engage with a pedagogy of emotions?

Lessening harm and trauma

o   "Studies show that professional actors and performers are more likely than their civilian counterparts to suffer from depression, anxiety, and various other mental health struggles." Arias, Gabrielle L. (2019)  In the Wings: Actors & Mental Health A Critical Review of the Literature. Master's Thesis. Lesley University. Cambridge, Massachusetts.  

The Myth of Innate Competency – 'We all experience emotions, so we are already emotional experts with an infinite catalogue of expressions, intensities, and mixes.'

o   The assumption that all performers already possess a complete understanding of all emotional possibilities for performance is harmful especially to people with neurodiversities such as alexithymia, social-emotional agnosia, Social Anxiety Disorder and Autism.

Autonomy

o   This work allows us to befriend our body, mind, and communication choices through somatic recognition, boundaries work, consent, and empathy for self and others.

What is covered in an EmoVerity emotion pedagogy course?

Practical explorations to embody the three Components of Emotion which:

    • engage a physiological response (awareness of affect as an internal physical sensation or the interoceptive sense, e.g., temperature changes and shifts in breath/heart rate or cardioception, balance and digestion).

    • create a recognizable behavioral or expressive response (awareness of emotion expression as movement or the kinesthetic/proprioceptive sense, .e.g., facial expression and body posture/muscle tonus activation which are clearly recognizable as an emotion category e.g. anger, fear, sadness, happiness, tenderness, pleasure).

    • identify a personal subjective experience (the ability to cognitively identify an emotion as a memory, scenario, or word as an emotional concept or ‘feeling’) and the awareness of how that feeling shifts perception of the external world or the exteroceptive sense.

A pedagogy for the physical literacy of emotion which seeks to:

    • understand how behavioral expressions of an emotional state may be received by an observer (favorably or unfavorably, viewed as genuine or ingenuine).

    • cultivate the ability to clearly and immediately shift from one emotional state to another, and clear oneself from any emotional expression at will.

    • create an embodied articulation of emotional intelligence and emotional regulation

      • Participants learn how to identify their own emotional states and the emotion behavior/communication of others.

      • Through in person training (and access to an online course) participants are given a clear pathway to physically regulate emotional states within themselves.

      • Acquisition of these skill sets allows for an expanded choice in communication behaviors with others, and helps to develop a greater response ability in daily life.

EmoVerity Emotion Performance Pedagogy imparts a set of tools to meet artistic expectations for emotional expression and nonverbal communication

  • These skill sets create accessible, reliable, and repeatable emotional access and release.

  • Once learned, these tools can be applied and integrated into performance to create powerful, human expressions of art, storytelling, and communication which do not rely on the use of the performer’s own memories or trauma.

Defining Parameters Surrounding Emotional Performance Pedagogy

·        At EmoVerity, we respect Emotion Performance Pedagogy as a distinct arts-related discipline that is adjacent to voice and speech, singing, theatre, dance, and on-camera performance disciplines. It is not an acting technique, it is a method for acquiring a physical literacy of emotions and accessing the related disciplines of emotional intelligence and emotional regulation.

·        Emotional Performance Pedagogy should always be skillfully integrated into all performance disciplines to complete the aesthetic and semiotic experience of emotional performance for the enjoyment of the audience as well as the performer.

Expectations around acquisition, transference, and integration into coaching, rehearsal process, and performance

o   An introductory/basic exploration (less than 30 hours of instruction) cannot possibly confirm competency but is intended to introduce the foundational principles for ongoing practice and training.

o   After approximately 30 hours of training, these skill sets are frequently used in the coaching and/or rehearsal processes as a focused exploration of emotional possibilities for performance and nonverbal communication.

o   Students who have studied for 40 weeks (80+ hours) of progressive and cumulative content will have much more reliable and proficient skill sets and be ready to transfer and integrate these skills into their particular performance discipline(s).

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