ABSTRACT
The main tools of dance movement therapists are their own and their clients’ bodies. Engaging with the ideas of Swaab, Damasio, Schore, and Brody points to the fact that the bodily and non-verbal basis for gender identity is established very early in a human life and socialisation plays its role from the very beginning. Unfortunately, there is not much research on the influence of gender identity in the therapeutic process in dance movement therapy (DMT) or in other body-oriented therapy. In DMT education and practice, there are more female than male students, teachers, practitioners, and clients. Since dance and movement are ultimate expressions of ‘embodied performances’, they are the perfect means with which to experiment with multiple perspectives. The therapists also filled in a Laban movement analysis Coding Sheet with the categories Effort, Body, and Shape and Space, thus revealing how they experienced in body language and movement their own gender identity’s influence.
