The Embodied Teaching Moment:

In this article the author dialogues with two contemporary dance teachers about how the practical-pedagogical knowledge of the teacher is embodied. The focus is on how the dance teacher functions as a lived body (Merleau-Ponty, 1962/2002) while in the teaching moment. The analysis of the empirical material shows that there is a continuous exchange between the dance teachers’ bodily experiences, inner dialogue and teaching choices while teaching. It is argued that its is not wrong to say that all these two dance teachers do as teachers is bodily grounded. The ways in which the practical-pedagogical knowledge of the two contemporary dance teachers is embodied can be summarized as a bodily listening, bodily tutoring and bodily ambiguity surrounded by constantly and rapidly changing body tunes throughout their teaching. These larger themes are divided into nuances which are presented and discussed in the article. The study is also a method study in how to study in and with the arts. The research process is understood as an iterative cyclic web (Smith and Dean 2009), where practice and theory take place in every sub-process of the study. Outcomes of the study are both theorisation as this article and artwork in the form of choreographies by the two dance teachers. These can be seen at https://vimeo.com/40433953 (Mari) and https://vimeo.com/40075211 (Ingeborg).