The Empowering Effect of Embodied Awareness Practice on Body Structural Map and Sensorimotor Activity: The Case of Feldenkrais Method

While outcomes of embodied awareness practices in terms of improved posture and flexibility, movement efficiency, and well-being are often reported, systematic investigations of such training effects and of the actual nature, extent, and neurofunctional correlates of learning mechanisms thought to lie at the core of such practices are very limited. The present study focused on the Feldenkrais method (FM), one of the most established embodied awareness practices, and aimed at investigating the neurofunctional outcomes of the somatic learning process at the core of the method by testing the modulations induced by a standardized FM protocol on the complexity of practicers’ body structural map and on the activity of their sensorimotor network during different movement-related tasks (i.e., gestures observation, execution, and imagery). Twenty-five participants were randomly divided into an experimental group—which completed a 28-session FM protocol based on guided group practice—and a control group, and underwent pre-/post-training psychometric and electrophysiological assessment. Data analysis highlighted, at the end of the FM protocol, a significant increase of EEG markers of cortical activation (task-related mu desynchronization) in precentral regions during action observation and in central regions during action execution and imagery. Also, posterior regions of the sensorimotor network showed systematic activation during all the action-related tasks.

Sensory sociological phenomenology, somatic learning and ‘lived’ temperature in competitive pool swimming

In this article, we address an existing lacuna in the sociology of the senses, by employing sociological phenomenology to illuminate the under-researched sense of temperature, as lived by a social group for whom water temperature is particularly salient: competitive pool swimmers. The research contributes to a developing ‘sensory sociology’ that highlights the importance of the socio-cultural framing of the senses and ‘sensory work’, but where there remains a dearth of sociological exploration into senses extending beyond the ‘classic five’ sensorium. Drawing on data from a three-year ethnographic study of competitive swimmers in the UK, our analysis explores the rich sensuousities of swimming, and highlights the role of temperature as fundamentally affecting the affordances offered by the aquatic environment. The article contributes original theoretical perspectives to the sociology of the senses and of sport in addressing the ways in which social actors in the aquatic environment interact, both intersubjectively and intercorporeally, as thermal beings.

Peningkatan Hasil Belajar Mata Pelajaran Matematika melalui Pendekatan SAVI (Somatis, Auditori, Visual, Intelektual) pada Siswa Kelas V-A MIN I Yogyakarta

The purpose of this study was to determine the learning outcomes of VA MIN I Yogyakarta class students with the Somatic Visual Intellectual Education (SAVI) approach with the Class Action Research method (classroom Action Research). It can be seen from the pre-action class score of 72.14 with the completeness percentage of 62.96%. With the increase in mathematics learning outcomes in the learning cycle 2 times. Somatic learning students want to move, want to understand the characteristics of building space with a visual model capable of attracting students to the subject matter, the auditory model helps students capture material and trains students to evoke imagination in determining the properties of building space, while the intellectual model helps students learn by understanding and mastering the material. I obtained the mean value of the class s 84.81 with a percentage of 81.49%. Cycle II obtained a class average value of 91.85 with a completeness percentage of 96.29%. The limitation in this study is only using the SAVI approach in Yogyakarta MIN I VA class 2018/2019 class students and not yet comprehensive.

Exploring Lived Heat, “Temperature Work,” and Embodiment: Novel Auto/Ethnographic Insights from Physical Cultures

Drawing on sociological and anthropological theorizations of the senses and “sensory work,” the purpose of this article is to investigate via phenomenology-based auto/ethnography, and to generate novel insights into the underresearched sense of thermoception, as the lived sense of temperature. Based on four long-term, in-depth auto/ethnographic research projects, we examine whether thermoception can be conceptualized as a distinct sense or is more appropriately categorized as a specific modality of touch. Empirically and analytically to highlight the salience of thermoception in everyday life, we draw on findings from four auto/ethnographic projects conducted by the authors as long-standing insider members of their various physical–cultural lifeworlds. The foci of the research projects span the physical cultures of distance running, mixed martial arts, traditionalist Chinese martial arts, and boxing. While situated within distinctive physical–cultural frameworks, nevertheless, the commonalities in the thermoceptive elements of our respective experiences as practitioners were striking, and thermoception emerged as highly salient across all four lifeworlds. Our analysis explores the key auto/ethnographic findings, centering on four specific areas: elemental touch, heat of the action, standing still, and tuning in. Emerging from all four studies were key findings relating to the valorization of sweat, and the importance of “temperature work” involving thermoceptive somatic learning, and physical–culturally specific bodily ways of knowing and sense-making. These in turn shape how heat and cold are actually “felt” and experienced in the mind–body.

Somatic Skill Transmission as Storytelling: The Role of Embodied Judgment in Taijutsu Practice

Examining movement learning though Piercean semiotics, this article affirms the basic embodied notion that to utilize one’s body constitutes a form of thought. Through a case study that focuses on theorization of skilled movement in a Japanese martial art that has been transported into North America, I examine processes involved in somatic learning, including both ontological as well as epistemological aspects. I suggest that embodied skills are passed on through story telling, rather than through more conventional models of “passing down information.” Learning somatic skills, or learning more generally, can thereby be conceptualized as a process of attuning judgment, in contrast to acquiring a set of internalized representations about the world.