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Mrs Marie Hay

Job: Senior Lecturer in Dance

Faculty: Arts, Design and Humanities

School/department: School of Humanities and Performing Arts

Research group(s): Centre for Interdisciplinary Research in Dance (CIRID)

Address: 51Âþ»­, The Gateway, Leicester, LE1 9BH

T: +44 (0)116 250 6185

E: mhay@dmu.ac.uk

W: /arts

 

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Personal profile

Marie’s current research focuses on the use of speech in the performance of contemporary dance. Taking a practice research approach, she has developed an improvised ‘speakingdance’ practice in which the dancer tunes into their sense of themselves to disclose their being through the rhythm of speech and dance. The practice has been performed and taught internationally.

In collaboration with dance practice students and Dr. Lucy Mathers, previous research work has resulted in the development of an autonomous learning framework. The framework has been used in dance and media technology at 51Âþ»­ and in the development of a feedback model in secondary education. This work, along with Marie’s research on the assessment and feedback of dance practice has also been presented and published internationally. 

Marie lectures in dance practices, feminism and practice research across the undergraduate programmes in dance and the post-graduate programme in Performance Practices. In 2009 Marie led the validation of the Performing Arts undergraduate degree at 51Âþ»­. She went on to initiate outreach work with schools and colleges across the school of visual and performing arts and is now the Programme Leader for undergraduate dance programmes. 

As Programme Leader, Marie has been instrumental in the delivery of de-colonising 51Âþ»­ objectives in dance. This work has been disseminated as a model of good practice.

Research group affiliations

Institute of Drama, Dance and Performance Studies
Institute of Creative Technologies (IOCT)

Publications and outputs


  • dc.title: Speakingdance: performing being with speech and dance dc.contributor.author: Hay, Marie dc.description.abstract: Speakingdance is a new concept-based approach to dance practice, in which the dancer’s sense of being is performed. The practice provides a meaningful purpose for speech in contemporary dance and challenges objective perceptions of the dancer. Philosophical thinking about speech and being provides a framework with which to reconsider the relationship between speech and contemporary dance to perform the dancer’s being. Speakingdance responds with: a new approach to improvisation, an affective conceptualization of being, dance that ‘speaks’ through a poetic rhythm, and a resonant relationship between the dancer and audience members. A practice research approach, that values the agency of the practitioner-scholar as part of a phenomenological enquiry, was undertaken to create the practice. Practical experiments with dance and speech were documented through video and written experiential accounts. Three ‘practice sharings’ were created to gauge the resonant impact of the work through audience participation and written ‘resonance narratives’. Resonance indicates a relational engagement with the dancer’s being. NVivo video annotation software was used to triangulate the relationship between speech, dance and audience participation. The ideas of Adrianna Cavarero, Martin Heidegger, Jacques Derrida, and Henri Bergson, provided a philosophical context for experiential knowledge. Writing facilitated reflection in which the concepts of Speakingdance were formulated. The practice research was structured around three key objectives: • Developing an understanding of the relationship between speech, dance and being. • Investigating how dancers can speak in performance without detracting attention away from the dance. • Exploring how speech can support the performance of the dancer’s being. Speakingdance has relevance for dance practitioners interested in improvisation, speech, and the performance of being. The practice encapsulates research on the topic of dance and speech, which is just emerging in academic fields. Uniquely, Speakingdance also contributes a consideration of the dancer’s ontology through a particular conceptualization of being. dc.description: This practical workshop provided participants with the opportunity to experience a sense of what I term the ‘internal-being-construct’, facilitated though my ‘just-be’ approach to improvisation. This prompted conversations about how dancers can tune in to a particular understanding of themselves. Shared with others through a poetic rhythm of dance and speech, this ontological awareness can promote a resonate appreciation of the nature of human being. The concept of an ‘internal-being-construct’ and the ‘just-be’ approach to improvisation were created as part of a wider Speakingdance practice that evolved during my practice research PhD.

  • dc.title: home|wohnen dc.contributor.author: Hay, Marie; Golob, S.; Soden, D. dc.description.abstract: The film seeks to explore the potential for ‘dwelling’ in domestic settings against the backdrop of two threats identified by German philosopher Martin Heidegger: the slide into an inauthentic life and the intense pressures of the modern world. The artists explore the interplay of these themes and their links to topics on which Heidegger is strikingly silent, such as family, through a poetic dialogue of Speakingdance, the voice and the written word. dc.description: Created and shown as part of the First Hand exhibition, curated by the international /origin\forwards/slash\ collective at Flat Time House gallery, London. 29 September - 5 November 2023. First Hand is the culmination of a three year digital placement at Flat Time House by /origin\forward/slash\, a group of artists and philosophers working together to collaboratively produce new artwork and ideas: https://flattimeho.org.uk/exhibitions/first-hand/

  • dc.title: The performance and perception of being: ethos, eidos and pathos. dc.contributor.author: Hay, Marie dc.description.abstract: This performative demonstration assumes Heidegger’s stance on Dasein as ‘being-in’ when he discusses issues arising from Dasein conceived of as subject and object in Being and Time. Heidegger proposes that Dasein is always already ‘seen’ in a certain way, which is mostly mis-interpreted, or interpreted in an ontologically inadequate way. The mis-interpretation of Dasein has been particularly noted historically by feminist dance practitioners in the US and UK, such as Jacky Lansley, Emilyn Claid, Yvonne Rainer and Trisha Brown. Their practice and writing highlights the perception, interpretation and definition of female dancers’ ethos as objectified within the limits of their outward appearance (eidos). This has often been theorized in relation to Laura Mulvey’s essay on the male gaze titled ‘Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema’ (1975). Through performed relationships between speaking and dancing, the dancer and perceiver identify with each other (pathos) and transcend dualistic categories. dc.description: First performed as part of a panel titled 'Heidegger’s Question of Being and the Ethos of the Dancer' at the Performance Philosophy Conference: How does performance philosophy act? Ethos, ethics, ethnography (22-25 June 2017) Prague. Further developed and performed for as a CIRID research seminar (October 2017)

  • dc.title: Things taken as obvious... distort. The speaking dancer and the Question of Being dc.contributor.author: Hay, Marie; Leach, Martin dc.description.abstract: What do we see when we see a dancer dance? It seems obvious that we see a body moving. But what if the dancer speaks? The animation of the body alone should have told us that we are not only looking at a body. That words are also spoken reinforces the fact that we are looking at a being, a thing-in-animation, and that the pro-duction of movement and word is not reducible to body but is concealed in un-say-ability. How might we say the unsayable being? This speaking dancer, this living combination of speech and gesture, may also be taken as a paradigm for the problem of considering what we see when we see any human being in its process of being. As Heidegger has observed, ‘things taken as obvious […] distort beings’. When we see and hear the dancer we think we perceive a body that is living. But what we really experience is the living itself in its essence of animation: the human being in the process of its being. How does the obvious presence of the body as the means by which words and gesture are expressed distort the essential being of the dancer? Does the body imply a being that is not there? And if so, is this unsayable being still a being? Does body distort being by obscuring soul? Flesh is flesh. Space is space. Time passes. Or so it seems. Here, in this room, we experience a dancer who moves and speaks. What can this tell us about the being of human being? We will explore this question through the format of a performative essay involving movement, speech and intervention. We will attempt to disrupt the obvious in order to expose ways of thinking about the question of being through the paradigm of a dancer that speaks. dc.description: First performed at conference: Dance Fields: Staking a Claim for Dance Studies in the 21st Century (19-22 April 2017) University of Roehampton. Further developed and performed as part of the Cultural Exchanges Festival (26 February - 2 March 2018) 51Âþ»­.

  • dc.title: What’s all this talking about? Once it’s said, they’ll be nothing left dc.contributor.author: Hay, Marie dc.description.abstract: This proposal is for a 10 minute performed, position statement and additional written paper in response to the conference sub-theme of ‘dance and movement: the physical and verbal body’. The provocation derives from a practice-as-research PhD engaged with philosophical considerations of Voice and Being and an examination of how speech impacts the performance and perception of female contemporary dancers’ identities. Therefore, this provocation will be presented through a collage of talking-moving improvisations that have emerged through research in the area of contemporary dance and speech in live performance. Anticipated discussion topics relate to the dialogue between speech and movement; the physicality of the speech act; and the talking-moving practice as a performance of self and a challenge to fixed identities. The research was founded through the recognition of speech in current contemporary dance performance as commonplace in contrast to a history of the dancer as a muted object. However, the inclusion of speech in contemporary dance work is usually set against a training that lacks experimentation with voice, speech and text. Therefore, this research creatively explores the potential for speech to influence the reception of female dancer identity through an integrated performance practice. The following questions have emerged through the research and will be presented for discussion: 1. What am I willing and able to say about myself in live dance performance? 2. What can speaking in live dance performance allow/achieve that movement alone cannot? The practice is currently in development with a variety of audiences who inform the content and performer-receiver relationship in each iteration. dc.description: The performance provocation and separate, precursor paper were part of the performer training working group at the TaPRA 2016 conference. The theme for the working group was speech and text in performer training.

  • dc.title: Being: exhibiting a speaking dancer’s practice dc.contributor.author: Hay, Marie dc.description.abstract: Through the installation of film and live work, Marie demonstrates the emergence of an improvised speaking, dance practice as part of her PhD research. The performance was programmed as part of the Cultural Exchanges Festival in Leicester as a double bill with Keira Martin's solo Here Come Trouble. The performance event was followed by a CIRID research seminar on dance, speech and autobiography.

  • dc.title: Designing assessment for autonomous learning dc.contributor.author: Hay, Marie; Mathers, L.

  • dc.title: Assessment and feedback: aligning dance practice with pedagogic research dc.contributor.author: Hay, Marie

  • dc.title: Changing positions: dance and the FE-HE transition in the UK dc.contributor.author: Hay, Marie

  • dc.title: Interpreting embodied dance practice dc.contributor.author: Hay, Marie

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Research interests/expertise

My general research interests in dance include the use of speech in performance; discussions of ontology; autobiographical practices: and ideas about dancer identities.

Areas of teaching

As a Senior Lecturer in Dance at 51Âþ»­, Marie teaches dance practice and practice research to undergraduate and postgraduate students.

Qualifications

BA (Hons) Contemporary Dance, 51Âþ»­ (first class)

MA Dance, 51Âþ»­

PGCertHE, 51Âþ»­      

Honours and awards

51Âþ»­ Teacher Fellow (August 2011) 

Membership of professional associations and societies

Higher Education Academy Fellow (2006 – present)

Conference attendance

Conference papers:

HAY, M. (2015) The performance of being: the emerging practice and perception of a speaking female contemporary dancer at the Boundaries: Transgression, Authority,
Performance conference, 51Âþ»­, 22 June 2015.

HAY, M. (2011) Designing assessment for autonomous learning at the Democratic learning conversations conference, 51Âþ»­, 16 December 2011. Research funded by the Centre for Excellence in Performance Arts and a Research in Teaching Award. 

HAY, M. (2011) Interpreting embodied dance practice at the Dance and Somatic Practices conference, Coventry University, 8-10 July 2011.  Research funded by the Centre for Excellence in Performance Arts and a Research in Teaching Award. Conference attendance funded by faculty research committee.

HAY, M. & MATHERS, L. (2011) Designing assessment for autonomous learning at the Assessment in Higher Education Conference. University of Cumbria, 6 July 2011. Research funded by a Research in Teaching Award. Conference attendance funded by faculty research committee.

HAY, M. (2009) Assessment and feedback: aligning dance practice with pedagogic research. In: Global Perspectives On Dance Pedagogy: Research And Practice.  51Âþ»­, Leicester, UK 25-27 June 2009.  Illinois, University of Illinois Press, pp. 92-97.  Research funded by the Centre for Excellence in Performance Arts. 

HAY, M. (2009) Assessment and feedback for autonomous learning in dance practice at the Eighth CLTR Learning & Teaching Research Conference, Edge Hill University, 3 June 2009.  Research funded by the Centre for Excellence in Performance Arts and a Research in Teaching Award. 

HAY, M. (2008) Assessment for reflective learning in the creative arts, at 15th International Conference on Learning, University of Illinois, Chicago. June 2008. Research funded by the Centre for Excellence in Performance Arts. 

Conference presentations

Solo performances of ‘speakingdance’ have been shared in 51Âþ»­’s Borderlines Conferences and Cultural Exchanges Festival. The first international performance was at the Performance Philosophy conference in Prague which then prompted invitations for Marie to perform in Croatia, teach in Beijing and collaborate with the Philosophy and Visual Arts Research Centre at Kings College, London.

Key articles information

HAY, M. & MATHERS, L. (2012) ‘Designing assessment for autonomous learning’, Practitioner Research in Higher Education. 6 (12) pp. 95-106.

HAY, M. (2012) ‘Interpreting embodied dance practice’, The Journal of Dance and Somatic Practices. 3 (1-2) pp. 201-214.

HAY, M. (2010) Changing positions: dance and the FE-HE transition in the UK. PALATINE, Lancaster.

HAY, M. (2009) Assessment and feedback: aligning dance practice with pedagogic research. In: Global Perspectives On Dance Pedagogy: Research And Practice. 51Âþ»­, Leicester, UK 25-27 June 2009. Illinois, University of Illinois Press, pp. 92-97.

HAY, M. (2008) ‘Assessment for reflective learning in the creative arts’, The international journal of learning. 15 (7) pp. 131-138.

Consultancy work

Consultant for Babington College (2012-13) advising on strategies to improve students performance through feedback and peer mentoring.

Assessor for BBC performing arts fund (2011)

Externally funded research grants information

HAY, M. (2010) Changing positions: dance and the FE-HE transition in the UK. PALATINE, Lancaster.

Changing Positions was initiated by SCODHE (Standing Conference on Dance in Higher Education) in conjunction with PALATINE, and funded by a PALATINE Development Award.

Internally funded research project information

Autonomous learning and emotional intelligence, funded by a 51Âþ»­ Teacher Fellow grant. January 2012 – July 2012

Autonomous learning in the creative disciplines: the transition into and through HE, funded through a Research in Teaching Award in collaboration with Lucy Mathers in Media Technology. February 2008 - July 2009

Professional esteem indicators

Reviewer - Assessment in Higher Education Conference (2013)

Reviewer - International Journal of learning (2008) 

PhD project

PhD title

Practicing speech in live contemporary dance: disclosing the dancer

Abstract

The thesis argues the case for a dance practice that uses speech and autobiographical approaches to disclose a dancer’s being. The improvised practice tunes in to the dancer’s silent thinking. In the rhythm between speech and dance, the movement reveals its own vocal ontology. Her vulnerable narratives find a discourse in the quality of her dancing. The dancer’s everydayness emerges and the audience find resonance in her becoming.

Names of supervisors

Professor. Sophy Smith, Dr Martin Leach, Dr Kerry Francksen

Marie Hay