Imagining otherwise: art and movement as tools for recovery

Abstract

Trauma threatens survivors with its permanent story. When reworked in language only, it can be cut off from the rest of its bodily manifestations. Integrating an embodied story of healing, in a meaningful and transformative way, means accessing multiple tools for recovery. The imagination is one of these tools towards holistic healing. This chapter explores how artistic expression can be used phenomenologically to heal wounds experienced from modern slavery and human trafficking. It will discuss how philosophy can give us language to reconceptualise healing as an experience of embodiment in relationships – drawing on the work of Merleau-Ponty and Ricœur. As a Pilates and Somatic practitioner working with survivors of human trafficking and modern slavery, this phenomenological approach has been a particularly helpful methodology to employ in my work. Whereas often trauma discourse can focus on siloed methods for healing trauma, situated in the symptoms of the body, I would argue that a phenomenological engagement with bodily movement, through Pilates and dance in particular, enables the survivor to heal. Healing can occur both through being present to the trauma that survivors continue to suffer in the present, and through reimagining a life beyond the trauma.