The body as territory: a movement perspective

ABSTRACT

Drawing on my background as a Mexican dancer and researcher, I analyse my practice-research on the body as territory, referencing the Latin American feminist concept of Cuerpo-Territorio (Body-Territory), which is rooted in the claim that ‘there is no ontological difference between territory and the body. Hence, what is done to the body is done to the territory and vice versa’ (Zaragocin and Caretta 2020: 1508). Within this methodology, the body-map serves as a ‘fixed locus’ where significant places such as the home, family, work place, or natural entities are located, allowing for a cartography of personal and collective connections to territory. I propose that the body, the space it occupies, and the place it inhabits are profoundly interconnected. I argue for the necessity of exploring Cuerpo-Territorio from a movement-based perspective in order to shift the notion of the body as fixed locus to a body in movement. I analyse two components of my approach: the body as territory as concept and metaphor that shifts from the static to the dynamic body; and workshops as spaces for collective embodied reflection. Each encompasses new ways of perceiving and moving from the body as a territory and, significantly, expands the Cuerpo-Territorio methodology.

KEYWORDS:

• Cuerpo-Territorio
• improvisation
• territory
• dance
• body-map
• embodiment

To speak about bodies is first and foremost to explore the ways in which bodies move. (Manning 2007: xiii; emphasis in original)

This article documents the development of a unique movement-based methodology for investigating the concept of the body as territory.¹ Throughout my career, I have observed the intersections and porosities of dance as a practice that facilitates an understanding of other fields of knowledge. Working from a perspective centered on the body, I understand these fields as intricately connected. While I position my practice within contemporary dance, particularly in movement improvisation and somatic practices, I perceive the knowledge generated in this field as transversal to various disciplines, concepts, and practices. This is how, then, movement can transform into modes of knowing, thinking, and researching.

I begin by providing an overview of Cuerpo-Territorio and understandings of the concept within contemporary dance, social science, and philosophy, before analysing a workshop conducted in Coatepec, Mexico, in September 2023. This workshop marked the conclusion of a series of eight held in the UK and Mexico, all of which served as collective spaces for participants to engage in the embodiment of the body as territory through movement improvisation and mapping.² My unique approach to the body as territory as a multi-layered process of meaning making and perception inherent in movement experience emerges from my experience as a movement improvisation practitioner, and in understanding and contextualising participants’ reflections on and knowledge of territorialisation³ from Latin American indigenous communities.

Cuerpo-Territorio: an overview

Cuerpo-Territorio constitutes both a concept and a methodology and was initially developed by communitarian and indigenous feminists from BoliviaGuatemala and Ecuador. Central to the framework of Cuerpo-Territorio is the statement that: ‘there is no ontological difference between territory and the body. Hence what is done to the body is done to the territory and vice versa’ (Zaragocin and Caretta 2020: 1508). In this sense, the body is considered the first territory, or the place of perspective (Viveiros de Castro in Chaparro 1998: 123) from which an individual’s singularity is situated in a reciprocal relation with the territory-place and other co-existing elements. Conceptually, Cuerpo-Territorio has evolved through the work of different Latin American feminisms, such as communitarian feminisms (Cabnal 2010, 2017; Guzmán and Triana 2019), indigenous feminisms (Tania and Manuel 2019)), and Latin American decolonial feminisms. Moreover, the concept has been applied to wider frameworks and spaces, such as the academic and urban contexts⁴ due to exchanges between feminist collectives, researchers, activists, and social workers. As a methodology, Cuerpo-Territorio is employed as a resource for community healing within the arts and in academic fields, from the social sciences to politics and economics.

I first encountered this concept through the research of Mexican anthropologist Meztli Yoalli Aguilera (2021). In their doctoral thesis,⁵ titled ‘Grieving Geographies, Mourning waters: Race, Gender and Environmental Struggles on the Coast of Oaxaca, Mexico’, Aguilera explores ‘the ecocide of the Chacahua-Pastoría Lagoons […] and its economic, social, and emotional impact on the community of Black and Indigenous women’ (2021, ix). As part of their research to explore the effects of the lagoons’ contamination of women’s bodies and livelihoods, Aguilera conducted a series of Cuerpo-Territorio workshops. In these workshops, participants were invited to create body-maps of themselves by drawing an outline of their body shape and adding representations of the lagoon, family members, and emotions, like feelings of loss and grief. According to Aguilera, through body-maps, ‘local women illustrate the intimate relationship between their own bodies, the lagoons, and the community’ (2021, x).

Aguilera’s work highlights how experiences are always contextualized within a socio-political and cultural context, emphasising our reciprocal relationship with the places we inhabit, and how they, in turn, shape our actions in the world. Reading Aguilera’s work led me to reflect on the interconnectedness of the body, the space it occupies within this reciprocity, and the place it inhabits. Considering the dissolution of the borders between the territory of place and the territory of the body through this interconnection provoked, for me, some initial questions: How do place and the self interact? What role do perceptions and movement play in shaping collective identity? Is identity an embodied experience?⁶ In this sense, Aguilera writes: ‘Through the body [we] can materialise how the environment is connected to the body and where the corporeal emotion is located within [our] bodies’ (2019: 116). By recognising the complex relationship between body and territory, Aguilera’s research contributes to the acknowledgement of the emotional realm as a potent force for encouraging communities to seek justice and promote social change.

As a methodology, Cuerpo-Territorio represents an ongoing practice for the sharing of collective and individual experiences related to displacement, territorial defence movements, exploration of ancestral traditions, and the utilization of diverse cartographic methods aimed at recovering and reclaiming territory-lands. One of its key components involves the facilitation of workshops engaging individuals directly impacted by territorial conflicts. These workshops encompass a range of activities, including the drawing of body maps that serve as surfaces for identifying and mapping significant places within the community or the person’s life. Within this framework, the body-map acts as a ‘fixed locus’ where elements such as the home, family members, relevant events, or a natural entity such as a river or a mountain, are located. This process allows for an alternative cartography of personal and collective connections to the territory. It has been particularly relevant for communities subjected to territorial dispossession, forced displacement, and the extractive exploitation of their lands. Through the exploration of cartography, conversations, and other activities, Cuerpo-Territorio serves as a conduit for collective healing, reflection, and activism in response to the challenges faced by communities defending their territories against the backdrop of capitalist, patriarchal, and extractive policies within Latin America. In this context, Guatemalan activist and co-founder of the community-territorial feminist movement Lorena Cabnal (2010) affirms that ‘the recovery and defence of the territory-land is a guarantee of the concrete territorial space where the body’s life is manifested’ (22–23).

In the process of analysing some of the applications of the Cuerpo-Territorio methodology and reading its theoretical framework, I realized that while the body is acknowledged as the first territory, or locus from which one perceives and engages with the world, it is often assumed as a mere surface upon which personal experiences and events unfold. Through the practice of body-mapping, people are invited to explore where within their bodies they feel particular aspects of the territory. This exercise of translation and sensation is powerful and profound because it enables individuals to recognise themselves as integral components of the territory. However, there has been limited exploration of how this translation and localisation of oneself within the territory can be felt in the body. Similarly underexplored is how, by sensing and moving the body, these affective and emotional relationships with the territory mobilise and change, and therefore create new relations. I argue that these new relations give voice to the body as an expression of the territory and as a territory itself. From my perspective as a dancer and researcher, I question what the poetic and somatic implications are of perceiving the body as territory. I am interested in investigating what happens when the body as territory explores itself through movement, sensation, memory, touch and sharing with other bodies in the space. Thus, I adopt Cuerpo-Territorio as a germinal concept in my own dance-oriented methodology, in which I propose a shift from viewing the body as a fixed surface to a body-movement. This new practice-based methodology contributes to and expands the limited movement-based explorations of Cuerpo-Territorio in the field of dance.

The body as territory: towards a movement-based approach

Using the body as territory as an alternative terminology offers flexibility in contrast to the more well-established term Cuerpo-Territorio, and allows for translation into and application within the methodological design of my dance research, which comprises the facilitation of workshops, the creation of choreographic solo performance, and development of individual practice. This methodology is underpinned and guided by my view of the body as territory, which builds on social sciences research and my own dance practice. The term the body as territory has been primarily explored by practitioners, feminist collectives, and academics (Grijalva 2012; Haesbaert 2013, 2020a, 2020b; Milán 2017) and particularly in the social sciences. The sources cited in this article concerning the body as territory and the concept of territory are rooted in Latin America, and more specifically, these references arise primarily from studies related to indigenous cultures inhabiting various regions of Abya Yala,⁷ where territory is conceptualized and experienced from a relational perspective. Indigenous cultures are multimodal in the sense that they maintain tangible, symbolic, and philosophical associations between the body and the territory through their language and other non-verbal practices such as visuals and gestures. While there are other relevant sources beyond the Latin American context, such as the work of aboriginal scholar Tyson Yukaporta (2019; 2023), which explores indigenous thinking on themes of place, knowledge, and narrative within aboriginal culture in Australia, this article predominantly focuses on Latin American sources. This choice aligns closely with the concepts of Cuerpo-Territorio emerging from this region of the world and the development of its related terminologies.

From a Latin American perspective, the term ‘territory’ embodies a multi-layered range of implications that weave together the ancestral cosmologies of indigenous and rural communities, the nation-states’ perspective on ownership and governance of what is often termed ‘natural resources’, and the territorial defence movements organised by urban and rural communities affected by extractive practices. Therefore, the significance of territory is never devoid of these co-existing conditions. Particularly in the indigenous context, territories are not only defined by closed precise limits, as in the modern western nation-state perspectives, but by ‘geographical marks which represent the bond between a group of humans, landscape and history’ (Echeverri 2005, 234). In this sense, ‘the notion of territory is conceived based on a relational model – as a fabric, not as areas’ (Echeverri 2005, 234; emphasis in original). I employ this definition of territory both as a theoretical construct and as a metaphor for the facilitation and development of embodied practice.

In his article, ‘Veredas’ (1998), Mexican anthropologist Ramón Vera writes of the Wixárika⁸ native community in Jalisco, Mexico. This is a narrative text that chronicles his experiences walking alongside the Wixárika people through their territory. This territory, despite being politically fragmented into different Mexican states, remains an indivisible geography in terms of traditions, history, and resources. When describing what the territory represents for this community, Vera writes:

Rock, chip, spike, thorn, waterfall, earth, gaze and step belong to each other; the attention that originates among all living things forms corridors of profound meaning. That is what people anchored to a community livelihood called territory. And everything lives, the stones, the mossy wall of the mountains, the forest, the grassland, the chaparral; the streams and springs where the filtered currents of nearby springs settle and create new landscapes and their infinite interactions. But, above all, territory for the Wixárika is human relations.

(Vera 1998: 3; my translation)

Vera’s description illustrates the interconnectedness between sensing and attending to the different manifestations of life, and the process of meaning-making related to these perceptions. When Vera writes ‘and everything lives’ (3), he speaks to the idea that everything that is part of the territory has an active role within the relational system. This idea resonates with the concept of hacer (doing), cited by the indigenous poet Hubert Matúiwàa (2022) in reference to Quintero (2016) who defines hacer as ‘everything that is on (-ou-) the world is presented as a living subject insofar as it possesses a doing (eiña) that is intrinsic to it because it is a member of a given community’ (Quintero cited in Matiúwàa 2022, xxvii; my translation). Both authors coincide to recognise the different manifestations of life that inhabit a territory, which are explored and signified collectively through movement, attention, and recognition.

In alignment with these reflections, Chaparro (2020) discusses the territory of the Kichwa Lamista people in the Peruvian jungle, and emphasizes the significance of walking within networks of pathways for nourishing relations with the territory and sustaining human life. Through their circulating movements, Chaparro argues, the Lamista community both produces and understands the territory. The author writes: ‘the forces that drive their movements and those that restrict them are considered as well as the ways in which walking constitutes people, the links between them and with other beings and the regeneration of knowledge’ (Chaparro 2020, 118; my translation). Chaparro’s statement emphasises the inseparability of the body, movement, and knowledge. The act of walking transcends a mere means of transportation; it becomes a form of embodied knowledge. Thus, knowledge is not only about the territory; it is produced from and through the territory. This is why the Lamista emphasise that ‘one needs to know how to walk to be able to go to the mountain: to know how to step on the terrain, control the body weight, imitate the sounds of the forest, among other abilities’ (Chaparro 2018: 123). This approach to knowledge highlights the deep connections between communities and the territory they inhabit, revealing that, for the Lamista, knowing the territory through movement is a fundamental aspect of knowing and through a proprioceptive process, a form of self-awareness.

For the Mé’phàà, an indigenous community in Mexico’s Guerrero state, the word for territory is ‘xtámbaa’, which translates to ‘skin of the earth’. In their language, the prefix ‘xtá,’ signifying ‘skin,’ is employed to create other words related to acts of care, such as ‘xtátsó’ (blanket), ‘xtáyaa’ (treetrunk), ‘xtìín’ (clothes), ‘xtíya’ (hive/skin of the water), and ‘xtá ga’un’ (womb/skin that feeds). According to indigenous poet and scholar Hubert Matiúwàa, ‘understanding the territory as if we were its skin is the principle of care and defence of life. The skin is the basis of mè’phàà ethical thinking’ (2018, 2022 xxii; my translation). Moreover, it also refers to the acts of care needed in order to preserve their territory but also their livelihoods. This encounter between skin and earth within the Mè’phàà language, which is simultaneously a reflection of their experience and way of thinking, invites us to contemplate and perceive the body as the first territory, one that extends in multiple directions, that both protects and delineates, while also allowing itself to be permeated by the surroundings and what lies outside. A body that is, in turn, a territory, and a territory whose skin is a sensitive and ever-changing network of relations.

For these distinct communities, moving through their territories enables the foundation of an embodied knowledge. Moreover, the existential-linguistic relationship, wherein what is lived by the community is named, alludes to the territory as an elaborate symbolized network. Simultaneously, this knowledge generates meaning and purpose, shaping the relational dynamics and principles that sustain their cosmologies and ways of life. These examples reveal the relational interplay of various components within this knowing process: the body (both collective and individual), movement, perception, sensation, attention, and signification.

Part of the challenge of my work has been finding intersections between research on Cuerpo-Territorio within the Latin American context and in the field of dance. One of the few dance resources⁹ that explicitly mentions this relationship is ‘Moving-Moved’ (2019) by Contact Improvisation practitioners and philosophers Romain Bigé and Hubert Godard. The authors describe ‘the-body-as-territory’ as ‘a bundle of affects and perceptions […] which is [the] body’s ability to prolong itself in space through perception’ (97). They further elaborate that ‘the-body-as-a-territory can also be called ‘the parietal body’ (97), which is ‘defined by walls or linings, and by the ability to expand these walls to the inclusion or exclusion of others. Allowing for the parietal-territorial body means making room for being affected’’ (97). These insights, along with the analysis of the Mè’phàà’s notion of ‘the skin of the earth’, form the central theoretical underpinnings of my movement-based approach to the body as territory.

In the case of Contact Improvisation (also known as CI), the interaction between dancers involves the creation of mobile surfaces on the body for the other person to explore, promoting a reciprocal relation between offering, inhabiting, and moving within these temporal surfaces. Within this context, Bigé and Godard highlight that, ‘The encounter between […] dancers constitutes a shared nomadic territory, a territory that we inhabit only transitionally, and where we invite others to dwell. We create a territory in the sole purpose of letting it be occupied by others’ (2019, 96). Bigé and Godard frame their ‘body-as-territory’ as capable of projecting itself in space, while also being a sensitive surface open to being affected and shared by other bodies. While the authors’ reflections originate from the context of CI, they introduce a component that is absent in the social sciences approach: the significance and implications of physical contact between body-territories¹⁰ and the analysis of the experience of movement. Thus, the element of touch becomes relevant as well as understanding the body as territory as a sensitive and mobile surface that is in the process of constant transformation, a three-dimensional body with a dynamic interiority.

Expanding on existing research, I suggest that the body as territory only exists through a relational perspective, and that it relies on the ability of the body to extend itself in space through perception, attention, and sensation. Moreover, the body becomes a territory through its potential to listen, change, relate, transform, and be moved, a process described here by Godard and Bigé:

When I listen to you … I can also listen to the vibrato of your voice, through the reverberations of your voice into my bones and viscera: in that case, I allow you into my territory, I let myself be affected not only by what you are saying, but also by how you are saying it.

(Godard and Bigé 2019: 97)

I argue that in the ability to extend the body in space through perception and sensation lies the felt sense of the body as territory. This sense is attached to a recognition of the correspondence between both elements. Moreover, a disposition to sustain a state of presence, crucial for this felt sense to exist, emerges as a form of solidarity. This solidarity can manifest as an individual and collective intention, or a desire to be part of a shared process. Solidarity implies being present. In the case of CI, this state of presence is essential for the contact work to unfold since the conscious attunement with one’s body in relation to another is fundamental for the creation of bodily supports. In my work, this process materialises in the workshops where participants engage with the Cuerpo-Territorio methodology. In the workshops, this form of solidarity is the underlying element for mutual recognition, participation, and the willingness to be moved by the influence of other bodies sharing the space.

Philosopher Erin Manning similarly reflects on the ability to extend the body through perception and sensation in Politics of Touch: Sense, Movement, Sovereignty (2006), in which she states: ‘Touch is the act of reaching toward, of creating space-time through the worlding that occurs when bodies move’ (xiv). Manning introduces the notion of a ‘sensing body-in-movement’ (xiii), one that emerges through and alongside other bodies and that is constantly producing new ‘relational matrices’ (xiii), that is, new configurations, new territories. Manning’s reflections coincide with Bigè and Godard’s notion of the-body-as-territory; both relate to the emergence of new body-territories as a result of a shared reciprocity where the dynamic interiority of the body, its perceptions, sensations, thoughts, and the relation created from the interaction with others are in constant flux. In this sense, ‘becoming-territory, relies on our ability to accept that things, others, circulate in us and out of us’ (Godard and Bigé 2019, 98). Indeed, the works presented by Vera, Matiúwàa, and Chaparro illustrate that in the worldviews of indigenous communities in Latin America, the territory is perceived as a complex fabric of relations. It represents a woven experience that connects the land with self-awareness, the symbolic, and the sustenance of life through practices of care and movement within the territory. From a dance perspective, specifically the insights gained from the work of Bigé and Godard, the body territory implies a relational dimension of feeling and sensation through touch and movement.

Espacio bromelia: body-territory workshop

Within my own practice research, I recognise that there are differences from the original Cuerpo-Territorio methodology and certain limitations to my approach. Firstly, I must acknowledge that I am not collaborating with a specific community linked by a territorial conflict or by a shared affective bond for a common territory, as was the case in Aguilera’s work with the community of the Chacahua-Pastoría Lagoons. This is a fundamental distinction from the original Cuerpo-Territorio methodology. For this reason, I positioned my workshop as focused on the body as territory as opposed to focusing on a specific territory-place. This means that although I recognise the situatedness of the workshop, its emphasis was not on the specificities of the place but rather on the body in movement as the site for exploration.

To explore this distinct shift in perspective, I devised a methodological approach structured in three phases: solo practice, The Body as Territory workshops, and a choreographic solo performance. Here, I address the workshops that comprised the second phase, and particularly reflect upon the last session,¹¹ held at Espacio Bromelia in Coatepec, México, in September 2023. The insights from the Mè’phàà language and Godard and Bigé’s notion of ‘the-body-as-territory’ underpinned the framework of this workshop, in which I explored the skin as a metaphor for defining and exploring the notion of borde.¹² Through improvised movement and by the sharing of weight with another body through contact, we explored the potential for a new collective body-territory to emerge as a result of this encounter.

Espacio Bromelia is a space for movement arts on the premises of a former hacienda, originally owned by Spanish colonizers, dating back to 1547. This building is situated in the Orduña locality in Coatepec, Veracruz, México (see Figure 1). Currently, this space serves as a venue for workspaces collectively managed by a group of multidisciplinary artists from Veracruz. Among these artists is Aisha Serrano, a Mexican dancer and improvisation practitioner. With Aisha’s support, I invited people interested in participating in The Body as Territory workshop. This was the final workshop of a series of eight, held in both the UK and Mexico. Each workshop has played a fundamental role in refining the methodology, testing dynamics, tasks, and ideas, and has led to the reformulation of and fresh experimentation with established exercises.

Figure 1. Espacio Bromelia. Beginning the workshop waiting for the participants to arrive. Photo by Kitzia Salgado, 2023.

First part: individual body maps

I began the session with a mapping exercise that aimed to answer the question: If I could express in an image how do I feel today, what I am bringing to today to the workshop, what would that image look like? We dedicated some time to tracing using coloured pencils, crayons, pastel oils, and paper rolls (see Figure 2). Then we translated these initial feelings, thoughts, and experiences into an image. Various elements emerged, including symbols, colours, or shapes representing emotions, significant life journeys or paths, and different intensities displayed by tracing stronger or subtler strokes. After drawing them out, each participant shared their maps with the group. These were some of the participants’ comments that accompanied their map-sharings:

Whirlwind, a tornado from my centre that makes my arms and legs stand like tentacles and plants. That’s me.

(Workshop participant A, 2023; my translation)

I feel excited […] the journey has been very nice and very connected with the water, before coming here it was raining, […] well first came the mist, then the rain, understanding the element of water, the emotions and the journey to get here, […], a spiral to find the place and then I found it, it was nice to see the little door and look inside and find you all.

(Workshop participant B, 2023; my translation)

Figure 2. Espacio Bromelia. Participants in the first mapping exercise. Photo by Kitzia Salgado, 2023.

This first exercise created a shared space through mutually attentive listening, with each participant contributing their present feelings, sensations, and thoughts into the space (see Figure 3). This provided a foundation for conceiving a common territory, through the collective acknowledgement of each individual’s experience and the distinctions and commonalities that the group found in resonance with each other’s map. As Bigé and Godard suggest, becoming a territory involves recognizing ‘that things, others, circulate in us and out of us’ (2019, 98). This initial exercise mobilizes those circulating aspects by having each participant articulate and express their singular impressions and experiences to the group orally and through the mapping process, thus creating a first shared territory.

Figure 3. Espacio Bromelia. Participants sharing the first mapping exercise. Photo by Kitzia Salgado, 2023.

Second part: the exploration of movement through contact

In this segment, I invited participants to delve into the exploration of the body as territory through contact and improvised movement. There were three layers of exploration. The first involved sensing another body through breathing (see Figure 4). The second focused on exploring moving surfaces through contact and sharing weight. The third opened the exploration by inviting participants to move through space, allowing for a temporal separation between the bodies. The following phrases were used to guide this section of the workshop:

Explorar la piel como borde poroso/Exploring the skin as a porous border

Entrar en contacto con otro cuerpo para sentir ‘su estar’ en el espacio/Coming into contact with another body in order to feel ‘it’s being’ in space.

Observar que formas y fisicalidades aparecen cuando nos movemos con ese otro cuerpo-territorio/ Observe what forms and physicalities appear when we move with this other body-territory.

¿Cómo se siente crear una superficie movible para ser ocupada por otro cuerpo? Cómo reconocemos nuestro borde en relación al tacto del otrx?/ How does it feel to create a moving surface to be occupied by another body? How do we recognise our edges and borders in relation to the touch of the other?

Figure 4. Workshops participants in the back-to-back moment of the session. Photo by Kitzia Salgado, 2023.

The focus was on exploring the notion of borde by sensing the edges and topographies of the body through contact, but also by inviting participants to embody the sense of a territorial border. What sensations and movement can be evoked when we think about our body in terms of territory, both as having a border and as a shared moving and sensitive surface? The skin was considered as a dynamic surface that, in its porous quality, both protects and connects us.

This session had eight participants, all of whom identified as women. We began the exercise in pairs (see Figures 5 and 6) and gradually expanded into a group composition without being directed to do so, allowing touch to encompass other bodies in the space. The first layer involved sensing, back-to-back, the surface of the other person’s body, their breathing, and their subtle movements. At this moment, I queried to the participants: What does that first sensing evoke, to perceive that surface, the border, the primary point of contact? Through this engagement, participants were invited to reflect, through sensations and experiences, on the body as territory, arising from the exchanges between skin and movement. I invited participants to feedback on the exercise, one of whom commented:

For me that experience of the border allows me to recognise parts or sensations of the other body, as if I could feel certain regions more present, as if I were not thinking of parts of the body but of regions or situations, so it was no longer me feeling another body, but my body in another territory.

(Workshop Participant C, 2023; my translation)

Figure 5. Workshops participants in the moving duets moment of the session. Photo by Kitzia Salgado, 2023.

Figure 6. Participants in the duet. Photo by Kitzia Salgado, 2023.

This comment led me to draw parallels with Echeverri’s (2005) definition of territory as a ‘fabric of relations’ (234), rather than as a perspective of isolated parts. Additionally, the reflection on feeling a region or situation acknowledges the dynamic and vital quality of a body as territory. Other participants also shared:

I find a certain language in me, in this weaving sensation (Workshop Participant D, 2023; my translation).

I was visualising cells, something like liquid, these processes, reproductive forms of cells suddenly coming together, then, they’re already two and then they come together, then they elongate, they become one form, they change, I thought of cells. (Workshop Participant E, 2023; my translation)

In these comments, vivid imagery such as that of weaving or the cell’s reproductive process arise from the experience of moving in contact with another person. Such images exemplify the multiplicity and complexity inherent in an experience of this nature, where various layers of knowing and information coexist and are moving alongside the body. As Manning (2009) highlights, ‘what moves a body, returns as a movement of thought’ (1).

Other participants commented that they felt that the sense of borders seemed to dissolve when they engaged in the shared movement and contact with another person. One participant went further, suggesting that when these borders dissolved, hierarchies also disappeared:

The border is dissolved, because it is no longer an individual body; it is a shared body. Neither are there two, it is only one […]. The hierarchies are erased the moment the borders are erased. […], then there is no longer a value. There is no longer one over the other, then they accompany each other and there is care and this thing of love arises. (Workshop participant A, 2023; my translation)¹³

This comment is significant in the conceptualization of the body as territory from a dance perspective, and reflects my earlier analysis of building on contact and improvised movement in CI. In a conversation held in 2016, CI founder Steve Paxton and co-founder and practitioner Nancy Stark Smith spoke about the politics of reciprocity in CI and suggested that it is a practice where the body and the relationships between dancers are not hierarchically structured, but rather, in continuous reciprocity (Paxton and Smith cited in Tampini, 2020). In CI, the whole body contributes equally to supporting movement, without any particular body part taking priority; this is in contrast to other dance forms, where specific body parts, such as hands or legs, play a central role in shaping movement forms. Moreover, power in CI is established through the dynamic relationships between dancers within their movements. This, ideally, implies the absence of hierarchical structures, as the dancers remain engaged in mutual listening while simultaneously assuming responsibility and agency over their own bodies. Likewise, the theme of hierarchy traverses the reflections of indigenous peoples and their relationships with their territories. Within indigenous perspectives on territory, it is acknowledged that each element of the territory possesses a place, a potential, and a purpose that contributes to the whole. This stands in contrast to the idea of a dominance or an entity reigning over the rest. From this perspective, within the territory, all elements are recognized for their singularity and their role in co-creating a common body. My working concept of the body as territory aligns with these aspects, in that its constituent elements are constantly in relation. This interrelation can take various forms, whether through physical contact and touch, the mere presence of other bodies, or an individual’s emerging kinesthetic awareness during the process of proprioception as the body engages in movement.

For the third layer of exploration, the facilitation prompt was: I open my eyes to see the space, to let myself move in the space, I feel the others, I observe how it is to be in relation to another dancer. If I find myself close, I can also join in, in this collective contact. Participants emphasized that opening the duets to the space allowed other forces and energies to ‘come through’ (Workshop Participant H, 2023; my translation):

I felt an internal sensation, as more organic, and this led me to the macro, to the external and I thought more about the wind or the sea, different points of contact that push you, but it is something already outside of you.

(Workshop Participant E 2023; my translation)

Additionally, they noted that when there is more space between the bodies, borders become more visible:

In this sensation [of opening the movement to space] the border is more visible, as if I no longer feel this union of, we are one body, but now I feel your body more. Is it more limited? I don’t know.

(Workshop Participant F, 2023; my translation)

Here, opening up to space implies a process of incorporating an additional element of perception that enriches the experience of sensing one’s presence in a particular place. That is the recognition of being situated and the influence that has on the way the rest of the elements (materials, forces, emotions and interactions) move us.

For this last stage of the workshop, the objective was to broaden our awareness and move across the space, considering various elements of the environment, such as architecture, nature, temperature, and shapes. Consequently, attention was distributed between the mover’s internal feelings and positioning their body within the spatial context. This process allowed us to welcome outer influences that shaped our movement experience. As one participant put it, it was about recognising ‘the earth within each of us’ (Workshop participant E, 2023; my translation), enabling us to project ourselves outward through our perception and create a body as territory.

Conclusion

What does territory mean to you?

Limite, refugio, propio, compartido, calor, sensación, exploración, hogar, descrubrimiento, juego, compañía, espacio, ritmo, tejido.

Border, refuge, one’s own, shared, heat, sensation, exploration, home, discovery, play, companionship, space, rhythm, netting.

(Workshop’s participants contributions, 2023; my translation)

This article is part of a series of ongoing reflections from my practice research, which investigates the concept of the body as territory. In aiming towards the development of an innovative and novel methodology, my work is contributing to the theorisation and expansion of the body as territory through movement improvisation, contact, and mapping. In doing so, I am addressing the paucity of theoretical considerations of this concept within the field of dance, and incorporating feminist and Latin American Cuerpo-Territorio perspectives into the development of a new practice research methodology. Specifically, my work seeks to enhance the Cuerpo-Territorio approach, building on the notion of a body-as-surface, to instead propose a multifaceted and relational process of body-in movement.

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No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Amira I. Ramírez Salgado

Amira Ramírez Salgado (Mexico, 1986) dancer and researcher. She completed her master’sprogram in Creative Practice: Dance Professional Pathway at the Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance in collaboration with Independent Dance and Siobhan Davies Studios in London,UK. Amira holds a Bachelor’s degree in Contemporary Dance from the Universidad de las Americas in Puebla, Mexico. Recipient of a danceWEB scholarship from the Jardin d’Europe foundation. From 2018 to 2021, Amira was as a lecturer in the Dance Department ofthe Faculty of Performing Arts at the Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú (PUCP) in Lima.She co-directs the annual video dance festival, Cuerpo a la Pantalla, held in Xalapa,Veracruz, Mexico. She is a co-creator of the project, Practicadedanzapensante, which aims to reflect with other Latin American dance practitioners on movement improvisation. Currently, Amira ispursuing her PhD studies in dance at De Montfort University (DMU) in Leicester. She is also a part-time lecturer in the BA in Dance and the MA in Choreography at De Montfort University in Leicester and a part-time lecturer at the University of Birmingham in the School of English and Drama. DMU.

Notes

1. This term has been used by political and activist feminist authors in Latin America, such as Mi cuerpo es un territorio político (My body is a political territory) by Mayan anthropologist Dorotea Grijalva (2012) titled Mi cuerpo es un territorio político. Grijalva argues that the body is not only a biological but also a social/political network, and, because it is embedded in a socio-cultural structure it can, therefore, be considered as the first territory. In dance scholarship, El cuerpo como territorio de la rebeldía (The body as a territory of rebellion) by Julie Barnsley (2006), uses the term territory in the sense of the ‘field of dance’ to explore her journey as a dancer, thinker, and choreographer.

2. This is an ongoing research project still in progress; there remains some unanalysed data from the workshops between 2022 and 2023.

3. Here I refer to the understanding of territory in practice, a dynamic process by which practices are associated with space in reciprocity. According to Haesbaert (2020a, 2020b, 279), territorialisation presupposes understanding the territory from a processual perspective, which integrates transformation and change.

4. See, for example, the work of Johanna Leinius (2021) who discusses the alliances between rural and indigenous women from Latin America with urban and mestiza feminist movements.

5. The author Meztli Yoalli Rodríguez Aguilera ;(LLILAS PhD 2021) won a National Women’s Studies Association/University of Illinois Press First Book Prize for her doctoral dissertation, ‘Grieving Geographies, Mourning Waters: Race, Gender and Environmental Struggles on the Coast of Oaxaca, Mexico’ (2021) that will convert her dissertation into a book, to be published by University of Illinois Press.

6. These questions emerged in the early stages of my research and helped shape its trajectory. In the realm of Latin American social science, scholars who have delved into the connections between identity and spatiality (for example: Santos 2000; Haesbaert 2020a, 2020b; and Gimenez 2004) focus particularly on indigenous and community practices within a territorial context. Other authors, including Henri Lefebvre (1974) and Doreen Massey (2005), have explored the creation of spatiality through perception, gender and human relations.

7. Abya Yala is a term often used to refer to the Americas, especially by indigenous peoples. It originates from the Kuna people of Panama and Colombia. In their language, Abya Yala translates to ‘land in its full maturity’ or ‘land of vital blood.’ It is used to emphasize the long history of indigenous presence and connection to the American continents, affirming that these lands were thriving and vital long before European colonization.

8. The Wixárika are an indigenous group in Mexico who live mainly in the mountainous region of the state of Nayarit and parts of the neighbouring states of Jalisco, Durango and Zacatecas. They are also known as Huicholes, and possess a unique and deeply spiritual worldview. Their religious beliefs are centered around the concept of ‘Wirikuta,’ a sacred land inhabited by their deities and ancestors. For the Wixárika, the act of pilgrimage to Wirikuta is not merely a physical journey but a spiritual one, representing the renewal of their cosmic and earthly connection.

9. Thus far, I haven’t come across other sources in contemporary dance that explicitly use the term ‘the body as territory’ as metaphors for embodied or creative processes. The literature I’ve encountered often employs the term ‘territory’ to denote the ‘field of,’ as exemplified in dancer Julie Barnsley’s work The body as territory of rebellion (2006) where, through the analysis of her dance career, she discusses the existence of ‘bodily energies that have been historically marginalised and usually hidden and repressed in the body’ (12; my translation).

10. Body-territories is a composed term that refers to the plural of body-territory, that is, several bodies interacting from a relational point of view and in contact with each other.

11. This workshop was facilitated in Spanish. To provide readers with a more immersive sense of the language used during the facilitation process, I include certain phrases in Spanish along with their corresponding English translations. It is important to note that meanings, expressions and linguistic nuances in Spanish may slightly differ from their English translation.

12. The word borde can be translated as border, edge, frontier, contour, verge or boundary. During the session, this word was used as a reference to the felt sense of the edges and contours of the body, through contact with the skin. The word also invited participants to reflect on the idea of border as in frontier, in the sense of separation between the inner (what is inside the person in terms of sensation and identity) and the outer (the space, the others, and the relations that emerge from this exchange).

13. All the participants comments where shared orally and have been transcribed, with permission, from the original audio files of the workshop.