Abstract
Transition to sustainability is a process that requires change on all levels of society from the physical to the psychological. This review takes an interdisciplinary view of the landscapes of research that contribute to the development of pro-social behaviors that align with sustainability goals, or what we call ‘inner sustainability’. Engaging in musical and dance activities can make people feel trust and connectedness, promote prosocial behavior within a group, and also reduce prejudices between groups. Sustained engagement in these art forms brings change in a matter of seconds (such as hormonal changes and associated stress relief), months (such as improved emotional wellbeing and learning outcomes), and decades (such as structural changes to the brains of musicians and dancers and superior skills in expressing and understanding emotion). In this review, we bridge the often-separate domains of the arts and sciences by presenting evidence that suggests music and dance promote self-awareness, learning, care for others and wellbeing at individual and group levels. In doing so, we argue that artistic practices have a key role to play in leading the transformations necessary for a sustainable society. We require a movement of action that provides dance and music within a constructive framework for stimulating social sustainability.
Highlights
In 2015, UN member states adopted the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.They define ‘sustainable’ as “meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs” [1]
We demonstrate how music and dance activities stimulate and engage emotions, which support the development of qualities needed for deep transformation and the emergence of inner sustainability
Music and dance can be seen as amplifiers of different messages and it is important to recognize their seemingly gentle but deep power, and to use it as another source of individual and societal resilience
Summary
In 2015, UN member states adopted the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. They define ‘sustainable’ as “meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs” [1]. A good deal of imagination and empathy is required to be able to understand how different unsustainable practices affect other people, or how they might affect them in the future The development of such inner sustainability is likely to involve a variety of cognitive processes, including acute self-awareness and compassion, and our social context and practices as groups: how do we need to listen to, communicate and collaborate with one another, so that we create a sustainable social environment? Activity in the amygdala, which can be recorded by means of functional magnetic resonance imaging, increases in emotionally charged situations regardless of which modality (visual, auditive, tactile, etc.) the feeling arises in This may explain why it is difficult to separate the modalities of music and dance from one another. To understand the potential for music and dance to be used to initiate and facilitate change towards inner sustainability; To review a range of research in which music and dance have been used to transform inner (internal) and outer (external) changes
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