Webinar & Book launch: Dance Movement Therapy and Sexual Abuse

In this webinar and book launch, Dr. Shuper-Engelhard, will begin with sharing her work as a dance/movement therapist with clients who have experienced sexual trauma, as highlighted in the recent book "Dance Movement Therapy and Sexual Abuse: Assessment and Intervention Based on Body-Mind Approaches." She will address the vital role Dance movement therapy plays in helping survivors of sexual abuse during childhood, adolescence and adulthood. 

Treating sexual trauma through Dance movement therapy triggers an encounter with body memories which, many times, patients have no possibility of expressing using words. Shuper Engelhard will describes manifestations of the dissociation mechanism in childhood and the significance of attention and sensitive orientation to embodied knowledge, for achieving a life not governed by the trauma. Lastly, she will examine ways in which the existence of child sexual abuse can be discerned based on manifestations and expressions of the body. 

Part two with Prof. Federman, will present the Movement-based Intervention Manual (MAMT) for assessing and treating trauma survivors. The proposed intervention model is based on a study which explored bodily movements of trauma victims as they recounted traumatic memories, and on the practical implications of the bodily movement categories found to be manifest when a traumatic event is recalled.

Part three concludes with Prof. Goldner, who will present two studies focusing on visual art and the experiences of dissociation. Design: 22 female incest survivors all diagnosed with different D.D., provided narratives and drawings about their experiences of dissociation. In addition, 82 sexually abused women provided self-drawings. The analysis of the narratives and the drawings focused on: reliving the experience of the abuse, the experience of disconnection from the body, the self, and the surroundings, the lack of coherence in the narrative, and the bridge between voluntary controlled and non-voluntary uncontrolled use of dissociation. She will discuss the data considering several trauma genic constructs, including a lack of self-sense, being entrapped in victim-aggressor relationships, and distorted time perception.

• Dance movement therapy and art therapy can help identify and intervene in situations of dissociation.
• Evidence suggests a relationship between non-verbal expressions and the emotional, verbal narratives of traumatic events.
• What cannot be said in words can be encountered by listening to the body's stories. What cannot be forgotten can be diminished through internalising normative, protected and hopeful body-mind experiences, and an object that can provide it with meaning.