- Jahrgang 67 (2022)
- Vol. 67 (2022)
- >
- Ausgabe 4
- Nr. 4
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- Seiten 503 - 520
- pp. 503 - 520
Social Choreography and Poetry during the COVID-19 Pandemic: The Poetics and Politics of Distanced Movements
Seiten 503 - 520
DOI https://doi.org/10.33675/AMST/2022/4/10
open-access
This publication is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons License Attribution - NonCommercial - NoDerivatives 4.0.
The COVID-19 pandemic has made visible the many ways in which moving (especially through urban spaces) is a matter of what I call, in reference to Andrew Hewitt, “social choreography”: the unwritten rules about how one moves through crowds, where one is able and allowed to go, and how one gets there. This article brings together aspects of social choreography, the movements within lyrical compositions, and the literal and figurative dimension of breathing in order to reflect upon individual and communal aspects of the force and power that is inhibited when people cannot move and breathe as a group. Examining Laura Mullen’s poem “Virus,” I concentrate on how breath and movement establish a sense of self; my reading of Claudia Rankine’s poem “Weather” turns to the racial inequalities that the pandemic has amplified and reinforced. Taking seriously the impact of bodily movements and rhythms of breath onto individual and communal identities, I explore the ways in which Mullen’s and Rankine’s poems present and enact shared breathing and shared movements as meaningful elements of individual and communal identities.
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