Ann Cooper Albright's Space And Subjectivity

“Space and Subjectivity”, written by Ann Cooper Albright was an article about how the connection of female bodily uses space and force to a women’s social status. Subjectivity is a “philosophical term that articulates the self in terms of the perceptions, feelings, and experiences from the point of view of an individual person” (Gieseking, J.J., W. Mangold, C. Katz, S. Low, & S. Saegert). Albright was interested in examining relationships between dancing bodies and space. Feminist philosopher Iris Marion Young identifies three different traditional modalities of women’s physical being in the world as ambiguous transcendence, inhibited intentionally, and discontinuous unity. Ambiguous transcendence is defined as not using one’s whole body
such as using only the forearm instead of the whole torso, shoulder, and arm. Throughout class, we have been performing many exercises dealing with imagining different body parts performing at different times. The exercise that came to mind when hearing the word ambiguous transcendence is where we had to hide a certain body parts, could only dance with one body part, and where we have laid on the ground and having to move one body part. This exercise was problematic for me at first, but once I quit thinking and put my mind aside as I just went with my body was feeling at the time, it was easier to perform this activity. This has allowed me to find new initiations from within and how I can use those to keep a continuous movement through my body. The second time that I performed this exercise with my body, I felt like a new person in how I was moving because I was choosing unusual body parts to move. Inhibited Intentionally is a term that refers to a lack of confidence or underusing your full or real capacity. Rather than straightforwardly going after something, women tend to be conflicted, moving towards something and withdrawing at the same time. Men on the other hand move smoothly towards something, unhindered and confident. In modern class, I continuously find myself stepping back at times and not fully going for what is out there for myself. I keep things safe rather than finding the impossible for myself. Recently, I have found that when keeping images in my head rather than thinking about what movement I am going to perform next, I find the impossible and experience new beginnings within my movement. This past Monday, Professor Gallo recorded the class moving in a sense of riding the momentum. Watching myself, I was surprised at the movements that were coming from my body. It was something that I wanted to capture and keep with me. Discontinuous unity deals with the laws of nature and how humans interact with nature, but in the sense of dance, it deals with not doing something all the way. Rather than using the whole body as an object with which to accomplish a task, women use only a sub-section of the body. As Professor Gallo stated how discontinuous unity deals with how humans interact with nature, it reminded me a lot to Professor Lings pieces is about how was interact with different textures of nature. When first starting to learn this piece, it was difficult for me to get in the mind sense of nature and how it would feel on my body. Continuing with this image, I started to understand my movement and how I could go further with it.
In addition to these terms, Professor Gallo stated that women in the world are often like this, but is it because we are taught to be like this or is it because how society dictates women to act.
Boys are usually seen as rambunctious, running around the house climbing on furniture and girls are typically seen as sitting quietly, playing with their dolls and reading books. Males see themselves as being able to lift or move objects around in their surroundings whereas women perceive themselves as being fixed and rigid and unable to move things around. They wait for others to move the object. Taylor stated in our discussion where inhibited intentionality is not only for women, but it found more in women because women have a higher expectation where the society expects more for ourselves. Taylor gave an example of how women should have more of a presentation more so than guys do. For example, you should look a certain way and act a certain way that we are all judged to a certain standard. As for guys, they can just roll out of bed, put clothes on and go to class and it is that easy. In our society, women are looked at as needing to stand up more for themselves and show that we are capable of the task that is given. I believe that guys and women should be held to the same standard because we are all capable of what is given no matter what the situation
is.
Martha Graham’s early work is described as masculinist in her feminism work. On page 345, Graham stated “tightness and hardness were entirely characteristic of the effort qualities her earlier work, whose vector of energy projection from inside to outside corresponded with contemporary Americanist and masculinist discourses, and constructed a paradoxically “masculinist” feminism, predicated on rhythms of empowerment”. Her choreography is very bound and strong movement and shows more male traits in her movement more than others. Sometimes this can be a hard line for women to walk as women try to expand forward. This is always happening in media today, such as a man can say something, but if a woman was to do or say the same thing, it gets a total different reaction.
In conclusion, this article, “Space and Subjectivity” was difficult for me to understand, but after going deeper into it during our discussion in class on Wednesday, I could better understand the differences in how men and women act. Not only does the three traditional modalities are being used in our society today, but are also seen in the dance world now and what happened in the earlier years. Personally, I have experienced these types of modalities in improvisation, but have seen a huge difference in myself the more and more I do not think about the concept of each exercise.