Revisiting dance therapy training with Marian Chace: 50 years on

Abstract

This paper intends to review my experiences as an apprentice with Marian Chace, pioneer of the newly developing profession of dance therapy, at the St. Elizabeth’s Psychiatric Care Hospital in 1966. It also aims to explore ways that Chace’s work anticipated current approaches to dance movement psychotherapy (DMP). Chace emphasised the importance of dance as nonverbal communication and taught her apprentices to aim for the highest levels of authenticity in their own expression. She often worked in a circle allowing all to feel included. Through her movement, Marian reflected back to the patients their nonverbal expressions. Current research into mirror neurons explores the theoretical basis for methods, which Chace used intuitively, decades before any neurological basis was discovered, revealing how the reflection and empathetic attunement used by Chace may have helped advance therapeutic processes.