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Walk, Dance, Chassé: An Invitational Score

Author: Jess Connolly-Smith

  • Walk, Dance, Chassé: An Invitational Score

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    Walk, Dance, Chassé: An Invitational Score

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Abstract

Taking the form of an invitational score, this paper responds to a question posed by the guest editors: What can dance do for law? My contribution is to show how site dance can further develop movement as socio-legal method. Site dance, as a choreographic practice that takes dance out of the parameters of formal performance, cultivates an embodied attentiveness to space, time, and the everyday. At the same time, a developing concern within socio-legal studies is the use of mobile methods to illustrate law’s involvement in making and unmaking space, place, and the everyday. Drawing site dance and movement as socio-legal method into conversation, I focus on walking as a shared mode of inquiry. Walking choreographically, as site dance invites us to do, encourages a mode of disorientation. The concept of chassé, in which the score is presented, a framing device and material metaphor for the interdisciplinary work of dance and law. The chassé aims to encourage a way of engaging with movement as socio-legal method through three micro gestures that serve as choreographic practice: tilt, breathe, listen.

How to Cite:

Connolly-Smith, J., (2026) “Walk, Dance, Chassé: An Invitational Score”, Law Text Culture 29(1), 21–34. doi: https://doi.org/10.14453/ltc.1859

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Published on
2026-03-26

Peer Reviewed