Bibliografic identification BESTOVÁ, Zuzana. The effect of The Feldenkrais method on body schema. Prague: Charles University in Prague, 2nd Faculty of Medicine, Department of rehabilitation and exercise medicine, 2012. 96 pages. Supervisor Mgr. Magdaléna Lepšíková. Abstract The diploma thesis deals with neurophysiological concept of body schema and evaluation of the effect of the Feldenkrais method (FM) on its quality. The research comprises two groups of probands without motor system disorders. The participants passed an investigation of the body schema quality by the following tests: a test of estimation of body dimensions (width of mouth, width of shoulders, width of hips and length of foot), a modification of Petrie's test, a test of proprioception and a test of graphestesia. The examination was accomplished before FM investigation and after the course. The first group (group A) comprised 13 individuals (5 males, 8 females) who participated in a semestral course of FM, the second group of probands (group B) included 17 individuals (3 males, 14 females) underwent a two days long FM program. A significant improvement (p = 0,0027) in the estimation of the length of foot was detected after FM intervention in group B. There was not a significant improvement in any of estimated body dimensions in group A....

The vestibular system has more connections with and influence on higher cortical centers than previously thought. These interactions with higher cortical centers and the phenomena that they elicit require a structural intact cerebral cortex. To date, little is known about the role and influence of the vestibular system on one’s body experience. In this study we show that caloric vestibular stimulation (CVS) in healthy participants has an effect on the perceptive component of one’s body experience. After CVS all participants showed a statistically significant difference of thigh width estimation. In contrast to previous studies, which demonstrated an influence of CVS on higher cortical centers with an intact cerebral cortex both the cognitive and affective component of body experience were not effected by the CVS. Our results demonstrate the influence of the vestibular system on body perception and emphasize its role in modulating different perceptive-qualities which contributes to our body experience. We found that CVS has a limited influence on one’s conscious state, thought process and higher cortical functions.

The vestibular system has more connections with and influence on higher cortical centers than previously thought. These interactions with higher cortical centers and the phenomena that they elicit require a structural intact cerebral cortex. To date, little is known about the role and influence of the vestibular system on one’s body experience. In this study we show that caloric vestibular stimulation (CVS) in healthy participants has an effect on the perceptive component of one’s body experience. After CVS all participants showed a statistically significant difference of thigh width estimation. In contrast to previous studies, which demonstrated an influence of CVS on higher cortical centers with an intact cerebral cortex both the cognitive and affective component of body experience were not effected by the CVS. Our results demonstrate the influence of the vestibular system on body perception and emphasize its role in modulating different perceptive-qualities which contributes to our body experience. We found that CVS has a limited influence on one’s conscious state, thought process and higher cortical functions.

The purpose of this project is to argue that we possess a minimal self. It will demonstrate that minimal selfhood arrives early in our development and continues to remain and influence us throughout our entire life. There are two areas of research which shape my understanding of the minimal self: phenomenology and enactivism. Phenomenology emphasizes the sense of givenness, ownership, or mineness that accompanies all of our experiences. Enactivism says there is a sensorimotor coupling that occurs between us and the environment in a way which modulates the dynamic patterns of our self development; the laying down of these basic patterns helps make us who we are and gives rise to the phenomenological, experiential mineness. Drawing on these two core ideas, I will be arguing for a Phenomenological-Enactive Minimal Self (abbreviated PEMS). I will be emphasizing the role of the body and the role of affects (moods, feelings, and emotions) as the most important components relevant to understanding minimal selfhood. Put more concretely, the set of conditions which constitute the PEMS view are: (i) The minimal self is the experiential subject; the minimal sense of self is present whenever there is awareness. It is the subjectivity of experience, the sense of mineness, or givenness which our experiences contain. (ii) The phenomenological part of the PEMS view turns on the idea of a bodily and dynamic integration of sensorimotor coupling and affective experience. It is, ontologically speaking, the lived body in enactive engagement with the environment. It is this embodied subject which anchors and forms the foundation for the later ‘narrative' self, which emerges from it and which is continually influenced by it. It is the subject enactively engaged with others, dependent on sensorimotor processes and affects. We have an identity, but it emerges from relational and dynamic processes.

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This thesis examines key concepts from philosophers Nishida Kitaro, Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Fredriche Nietzsche and applies them to elements of Michael Chekhov’s practice of acting. The three philosophers, in different ways, suggest an ‘optimal’ state, beyond a dualistic separation of the fictive from the real and the visible from the invisible, that challenges seemingly unbridgeable dualisms between inner and outer, subject and object, being and becoming and experiencer and experienced. The purpose of this thesis is to analyze and understand these selected ‘optimal’ modes of consciousness in performance and, therefore, open up new ways of thinking about Michael Chekhov’s acting processes; in particular the ‘Psychological Gesture’. The thesis asks the following questions: 1. How can the application of selected philosophical paradigms to the Psychological Gesture through theory and practice further our understanding of Michael Chekhov’s work? 2. How do selected aspects of the fields of phenomenology, post-phenomenology, cognitive sciences, consciousness studies and philosophy of mind, aid in developing an articulation and understanding of an ‘optimal’ state of consciousness as a necessary aspect of the actor’s performance in Michael Chekhov’s work and theatre practice? 3. How can this project develop the way we are able to talk about Michael Chekhov’s work and wider acting processes?