English (United Kingdom)

https://curated-unify.zendy.io/wp-json/zendy-region/v1/featured_content/oa?rat=en

https://curated-unify.zendy.io/wp-json/zendy-region/v1/highlighted_journal/

Global: Zendy Tools annual

Presents the keyphrase highlighting as premium feature

Keyphrase Highlighting

Presents the summarisation as premium feature

Summarisation

Insights

Presents the pdf analysis as premium feature

PDF Analysis

Presents the zaia usage as premium feature

ZAIA

Global: Zendy Tools monthly

Global: Zendy Plus monthly

Presents the access of premium content as premium feature

Premium Content

Global: Zendy Plus annual

Global: Zendy Free Plan

When teaching acting and movement in the university classroom, I often encounter a tension between training students in specific skills while simultaneously encouraging them to embody their psychophysical identities in relation to gender, race, class, age, and (dis)ability. In response to this tension, I apply my training in the ROSS system of Russian Martial Arts (RMA) to the acting and movement classroom. RMA exercises offer blueprints for self-exploration rather than formally structured patterns, prompting students to develop perception of their own bodies and minds, as well as those of their partners, while encouraging improvisation and adaptation. Students can practise at a range of intensities, from gentle and exploratory (Softwork) moving towards aggressive and outcome-focused (Hardwork). Further, students enter the training from their existing physical capacity and adapt, develop, and refine skills for playing committed action and sending/receiving impulses with a partner. Informed by the work of Ben Spatz, Ellis Amdur, and Sara Hendren, I will analyse how these RMA exercises develop specific psychophysical skills relevant to the training of actors while simultaneously inviting students to engage their social and artistic identities. I will place these exercises in conversation with theatre-based trainings, including the Six Viewpoints, the Acrobatics of the Heart, and the Michael Chekhov Technique. I argue that the open-ended nature of these exercises builds greater accessibility within existing performance pedagogy, opening the acting and movement classroom to a diverse community of performers.

Accessing Psychophysical Identities through Russian Martial Arts in actor training