Employing a Dance-Somatic Methodological Approach to VR to Investigate the Sensorial Body across Physical-Virtual Terrains

Abstract

This article takes a somatic dance standpoint to investigate bodily sensorial encounters with virtual reality technology (VR). Using somatic dance practices as sensory tuning methods, this article investigates the virtuality and corporeality of human and nonhuman bodies across virtual and physical environments and expanded sensory modes of seeing and feeling, using a multiperson interactive VR framework. Predicated on a dance-based sensibility and mode of engagement with VR, workshops crafted for groups of dancer and nondancer participants offer methods for the design and facilitation of VR encounters that expand ideas and expectations of both body and technology. Using autoethnographic writing and participant testimonies, alongside conceptual thinking around participation in VR, I present this methodological approach and demonstrate its potential to address new questions about VR experiences that are centred on the sensorial body.

Keywords

• somatic
• dance
• movement
• embodied
• VR
• sensory