Embodied Engagements: 2 Workshops with Kesha Fikes

Oct 19th + 20th                                                       12-2pm 

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Offered is a critical somatic exploration. The intention is to provide space for embodied dialogue with what remains politically unrepaired and viscerally unpresenced across campuses and indeed, across the world. Politics are such that the proposed space cannot offer emotional safety because the parameters of engagement are not neutral. Neither can embodiment praxes stand-in for any kind of communal “leveling” or resolution. This offering is a guided non-verbal inquiry – of slow, moderate, and fast pacing – where people of various bodily abilities assemble to track the suspended breath that right now cannot exhale. One should indeed be suspicious of embodiment as container for assembly under current conditions. Independent of everyone possessing a body, neither visceral attunement nor movement can transcend what is unrepaired. However, movement does indeed have something to offer, though not because something about it is exceptional; rather, experiential embodiment in today’s world is an obscured terrain that places introspective feeling and moving – in whatever ways one can – in the realm of the less familiar. Proposed, thus, is an animated non-verbal experience that maymomentarily support touching into something unknown. The intention is not distraction. This is about sourcing that bit of air, when exhalation is not an option, because catastrophe’s next moves are unpredictable. Dress comfortably, bring a mat or cushion (if you can descend to the floor), as well as paper and pen. Walking, sitting, standing, running, and breathe may never be the same after this exploration.

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Kesha Fikes
This inquiry is guided by Kesha Fikes (she/her), an independent scholar, somatic therapist, and social praxis facilitator. Her work centers the politics of everyday life, racial-gendered existence, global capitalisms, colonialisms, border politics, diasporizations, and politicized somatics. Her focus is creative disruption of the violence of universal reason in everyday life. Fikes holds a doctorate in anthropology and authored Managing African Portugal: The Citizen-Migrant Distinction (Duke U Press). She facilitates a psycho-political praxis she created, called Practicing Political Extimacy, which integrates somatics and political theory.

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