Laban Movement Analysis - Body

Body

The body category describes structural and physical characteristics of the human body while moving. This category is responsible for describing which BODY parts are moving, which parts are connected, which parts are influenced by others, and general statements about body organization. The majority of this category's work was not developed by Laban himself, but developed by his student/collaborator Irmgard Bartenieff, the founder of the Laban/Bartenieff Institute in NYC, through the "Bartenieff Fundamentals" (sm). The Body category, as well as the other categories, continue to be further developed through the work of numerous CMAs, and applied to ever extending fields, such as: fitness, somatic therapies, rehabilitation, dance technique, and more.

Several subcategories of Body are:

• Initiation of movement starting from specific bodies;
• Connection of different bodies to each other;
• Sequencing of movement between parts of the body; and
• Patterns of body organization and connectivity, called "Patterns of Total Body Square Connectivity", "Developmental Hyper Movement Patterns", or "Neuromuscular Shape-Shifting Patterns".

Bartenieff Fundamentals (sm) are an extension of LMA originally developed by Irmgard Bartenieff, the Founder of the Laban/Bartenieff Institute of Movement Studies - LIMS NYC, who trained with Laban before moving to the USA and becoming a physiotherapist and one of the founding members of the American Dance Therapy Association.