Entanglements of languaging and dancing: Exploring spoken word choreographies in upper secondary school

Description

Paper part of the thematic workshop: Embodiment and the arts in language learning

An increasing amount of research indicates that embodied learning and arts-based approaches can enhance language learning and provide emotional and motivational benefits to learning processes (e.g., Jusslin et al., 2022). Nevertheless, research-based knowledge about how embodied learning and arts-based approaches can contribute to upper secondary school students’ language learning remains scarce.

Contextualized within the dance course “Dance with language,” this paper addresses the combination of language and dance through spoken word choreographies (word- and dance-based choreographies). The course aimed to motivate upper secondary school students to study Swedish. It was initiated and taught by a dance teacher at a Finnish-speaking upper secondary school and included 19 students participated.

The study engages with new materialist theories to acknowledge the spoken word choreographies’ relational, embodied, and material aspects (Pennycook, 2016; Toohey, 2019). The analytic questions are: (1) How do languaging and dancing become entangled in the spoken word choreographies? (2) How can spoken word choreographies contribute to additional language learning practices in upper secondary school?

Using diffractive analysis with comics-based research strategies, the analysis suggests that languaging and dancing becomes entangled through four doings: exploring, re-working, co-creating, and negotiating-and-switching. The choreographies offer a potentially valuable way to teach language, moving beyond the potential restrictions in the language to emphasize playfulness and creative explorations as part of language learning processes. The study argues for the pedagogical value of providing room for playful, creative, and embodied additional language learning practices in upper secondary school.

Period	10 Nov 2023
Event title	AFinLA Syyssymposium 2023
Event type	Conference
Location	Tampere, FinlandShow on map
Degree of Recognition	National