domingo, 5 de mayo de 2013

Itinerario corporal







Me relaciono con otros mientras sin saberlo calculo pasos y movimientos desde una historia con otros cuerpos. Me ajusto al otro, a su cuerpo y sobre todo a lo que me pasa en mi propia carne a partir de verlo, sentirlo, anticiparlo, compararlo, esperarlo, desearlo. Nuestra interacción va más allá y más acá de nosotros. Por lo menos puedo yo reconocer cómo se cruza, combina y modifica a partir de mi historia con otros, de mi historia sobre mi con otros. Habla al aire todo, pero me habla; lo percibo en las palabras pero también en el aire que me llega como justo, desmayado, apenas móvil. Escucho palabras con los oídos, pero las entiendo primero con el aire que caliente, denso y estancado se detiene en mis fosas nasales casi ahogándome de necesidad. Las entiendo desde el pecho que aparece pequeño, localizado en un espacio mínimo, encarcelado, limitado por una estructura y una presión. Habla de mi, de mi propia pequeñez, de mi sombra y es como si hablara desde lo lejos, pero de algo tan íntimo que sólo hace eco y se percibe en las paredes retumbantes de mi caja torácica. Sus palabras me hacen cuerpo, un cuerpo apretado, incómodo, denso y marcado por lo homogéneo, por lo determinado, por lo incrustado y por lo que es. Cuerpo estático es el que amarran sus palabras, haciéndome tan yo misma que ya no puedo escuchar cómo sigue, qué cruces y desvíos hace su discurso, sino que sólo soy esas mismas palabras que me cosifican una y otra vez, al pulso de un segundero agitado que percibo solo yo (eso pienso) en mi corazón. Las palabras cuajan con su sentido rotundo, declaratorio y triunfante sobre mi, las palabras se encajan en mis ojos y no puedo sino probarlas a través del calor, de la fragilidad y de la vergüenza que delinean en el contorno de mi ojos. Las tengo ahí, aunque intente mirar detenidamente, como distraídamente, un conjunto de taza, plato y cuchara. Por mucho que mis movimientos estén en la mano que se funde con la cuchara para suavemente acariciar el agua, el verdadero movimiento de la vida presente está en mi pecho, en mis ojos y en mi cabeza que se siente como un globo suspendido en un punto detenido entre corrientes de aire. El tiempo se percibe lento, agonizante en las palabras lejanas del otro, y mi conciencia se aferra toda al espacio protegido de mi cuerpo queriendo cerrar sus entradas y bordes para paralizar la interacción, o mejor dicho el aluvión de sentimientos que me genera su acción. Tengo la sensación de estar en medio de un terremoto causado por mi propia existencia, en consecuencia respiro invisible y me mantengo cabizbaja como si ello pudiera prevenir algo del movimiento a mi alrededor. Hasta ahora he evitado mirarlo, las palabras y toda la carne que traen sobre mi es demasiado, no podría además sostener la complejidad de gestos o la ambigüedad de la mirada. 


Es totalmente probable que en realidad no haya podido oír, ni menos aún comprender todo lo que dijo. Es muy probable que me haya quedado calzada con lo parcial que toca mi historia, mi desnudez, mi fragilidad. Pero es que así como el cuerpo nos habilita en el intercambio, a veces fluido a veces duro, con el otro, también el cuerpo puede robarnos a un rincón personal asolado y cautivo de ecos que lloran la posible proyección de la propia fragilidad histórica. Primero hubo cuerpo y sentidos inmediatos, fijados, irruptores, sólo con el rato apareció una palabra más trenzada y disponible, al pensamiento, al juicio, y a la posible incorporación del mundo y de otros. Recién ahí me pude mover, yo me pude mover. Pero no fueron movimientos ingenuos ni flexibles.  Con la huella de la implosión de mi como cuerpo, me moví cual robot, sintiendo que tomaba mis pesadas y dormidas piernas y brazos para incorporarme, para erguirme. Decidí erguirme y traté de hacerlo lento, con gracia y relajo. Hice los movimientos pensando en la conciencia de otros, y de la reacción que les vendrían al verme incorporarme y alejarme, pero mi conciencia corporal era otra. Me sentía totalmente quebrada, por un lado la mente intentando coordinar los movimientos de un cuerpo para que se viera fluido, espontáneo, casi indiferente, mientras por otro lado mi sensación corporal era de un cuerpo lejano, otro, respirando con aires de vencido y de quedar sólo brasas.

miércoles, 4 de julio de 2012

Opening, affecting and connecting the body´s materiality to the otherness

By stressing the dynamic connections established between mind and body in Iyengar yoga practice, I have presented some of the ways in which the multiple body (somatically felt, sentient and feeling) is constituted and experienced. Now, I will focus on the ways in which the body (and its experience) is done through practice, drawing particular attention to the body´s capacity to be open to being affected by the other. In order to do this I will foreground the practice -in the way it is done within the perspective of Actor Network Theory [ANT] (cf. Akrich and Pasveer 2004, Mol and Law 2004)- to show how it works to create the particular experience of the embodied self which was presented. As it was explained in the introduction, this approach is of great value, since it complements the phenomenological perspective of the lived body by displaying all the body´s potential for relationality. While the first approach allowed to exhibit the ways in which Iyengar yoga defies the mind-body split, this part will show how the practice challenges the assumption of a singular, fixed and bounded body and its correlative conception of a self-contained subject.
Latour´s (2004) article ‘How to Talk About the Body?’ is a good illustration of conceptualizing the body as always multiple in the sense that it is open to different kinds of assemblage with techniques, artefacts and practices, by which it is constituted. By using the example of the odour kit he shows how the body´s capacity for developing a good nose is not isolated from the material, social and cultural context, but rather it is the result from the articulations by which the body learnt to be affected –in this case by the odour kit.
Starting from Latour´s approach and this specific example, it is possible to expand our understanding of the body´s transformation as a result of its connection with the mind, complementing it with the idea of a body which can learn to be open not only to the subject´s reflexivity and intentionality, but also to the material conditions that surround it. From here, I will explore how the use of props in the practice of Iyengar yoga offers a particular form of articulation which is central for the enactment of the lived body I have described.
Something that is learned through Iyengar practice is that props cannot be understood as pre-existing and pre-defined objects, which are separate and ready to be used by the practitioner. Actually, props are defined not so much by their material characteristics (form, texture, weight, etc.), but rather by the way in which they are used. Therefore, what might be seen as a singular and fixed chair can be transformed, when used as prop, into a multiple artefact with many possible and different uses. Despite their multiple functions, props are defined ultimately by their articulation with the practitioner´s body, an articulation which implies a dynamic entanglement rather than a mere interaction between two separate entities, i.e. object and subject. This articulation simultaneously demands and promotes in the practitioner the embodied learning to be affected, i.e. the possibility to be open to that process of interpenetration with the material other. Here, to be open means something very concrete as it is through the skin that prop and body are entangled. In the body/prop conjoining, the limit of the skin is transformed into a permeable interface allowing the interchange between the inside and the outside.
We might think about this by drawing on Howes’ (2005 in Blackman 2008) notion of ‘skin knowledge’, which refers to the skin as more than physical surface, considering it as “a form of intelligent bodily knowing” (2008: 86) which is characterised as not simply cognitive but also tactile. Using this notion, it is possible to understand the importance of the skin in Iyengar yoga practice, for it is the site by which the embodied self is connected with the other (human and non-human), but also as it is the place where the bodily awareness can be developed.
Supta Virasana
In order to have a more embodied approach to the assemblages between body and prop, and particularly to the role played by the skin in them, let us resort to some examples. In the photograph we can see the performing of Supta Virasana (Reclining Hero pose) with four props (one blanket, one belt and two blocks). From an external point of view it might be judged as an easy posture, since it appears as a mere action of lying. However, there can also be a lot of action and movement happening in the sentient and felt body and this is directly dependent on the way the body is open to be affected by the props.
In this case, each prop constitutes a particular conjoining with a specific part of the body, which means that they are being affected in different ways. The articulation blanket/gluteus, for example, is touching the gluteus´ skin in a way that gives to them a particular direction. But none of these articulations are intended to affect only the body´s surface, but rather to be incorporated through the skin as a more internal bodily awareness. In this case, the contact created between the blanket and the gluteus allows the development of a sensibility which penetrates from the skin to the gluteus and from there to the lower spine (coccyx). With the conjoining block/upper back is a little different, since what is incorporated is not a direction or movement through the skin, but rather the action of pushing. Here, to be open so as to be affected means not to resist the block, but rather to be able to let go the corporeal materiality in a way that the upper back is incorporated in the body´s flesh while the body is penetrating the block. The sensibility is transmitted from the back to the front, allowing the opening of the chest from the internal movement. Finally, in the articulation block/head, the block is providing a support for the head. Nevertheless, by letting the head to be heavy on the block´s surface, an internal movement can be felt: the front starts lying on the back with perceptible changes in facial muscles and skin, where tension starts to be released.   
This example illustrates how the sentient and felt body experienced in Iyengar practice is not the result from an entanglement between mind and body situated just within the individual. It is rather produced by specific forms of assemblage between the body and its context –here materialised by the props. The direct implication of this is that the body´s boundaries are disclosed as porous and therefore the inner/outer and self/other distinction is destabilised. Rather than a fixed and bounded body and self, through this analysis of Iyengar yoga is revealed an embodied self, opened through the body´s capacity to be affected, and which is always becoming different by being done and enacted through different forms of mediation.


Bibliography

Akrich, M. and Pasveer, B. (2004). Embodiment and Disembodiment in Childbirth Narratives. Body & Society 10(2-3):63-84.
Blackman, L. (2008) The Body: Key Concepts. Oxford: Berg.
Latour, B. (2004) ‘How to Talk About the Body? The Normative Dimension of Science Studies’. Body & Society 10(2-3): 205-229.
Mol, A. and Law, J. (2004) ‘Embodied action, Enacted Bodies: The example of Hypoglycaemia’. Body & Society 10(2-3): 43-62.