Butoh Dictionary

In Shadowbody, the baby body is one of the human character tropes or butoh in real life that either inspires or resembles butoh.

The baby due to its multidimensional embodied resonance patterns is often seen as already being a butoh master. We were all butoh masters at one point.

In Deleuze and Guattari’s philosophy, “becoming-” describes a process of continuous transformation where identity is fluid, never fixed, moving beyond categories like human/animal or self/other.

"X" can be anything.

If I enter into a becoming-wolf for instance, it is not that “I act like a wolf,” but “I enter into a relational field where my rhythms, gestures, and instincts resonate with wolf-being."

So becoming is about resonance.

Concept from Rhizome Lee's Subbody denoting a background world such as what is often occurring at the subconscious level. The concept is frequently linked to the literal presence of what lies behind on stage—other performers, unseen forces, or hidden worlds that emerge from behind the dancer.

A central concept in butoh and Noguchi taiso, where movement does not originate from self-will but arises through external or internal forces—such as strings, qualias, or memories—diminishing the role of ego or personal control.

Drawing inspiration from a CT body scanner, the dancer “scans” their body for sensations and feelings.

Motimaru Butoh Company practiced this in a standing position while linking movement and arm gestures with the scanning of the whole body.

A Shadowbody term interchangeably called qualia tattoos, qualia yoga or qualia gong, which are all qualia-guided movement conditioning.

Using qualia/imagery for body work will often naturally let the central nervous system facilitate a more efficient series of muscles to perform whatever action there is to do. In this way, we can break old habits and possible inefficient movement. This is the idea behind ideokinesis, which is also a discipline of image-based body rehabilitation and posture correction.

A Subbody term denoting an edge or trigger. Viewed as a deep shadow. These have big potentials for artistic creation.

In terms of Shadowbody and especially the Christian-themed butoh Theokinesis, not all bottom bodies can be integrated, as some things are dangerous to "integrate." Instead, the emphasis is on transformation, and in transformation, some things have to die or be sacrificed.

A Tatsumi Hijikata concept of dancing in the most constricted space possible.

The method belonging to Turkish butoh artist Özerk Sonat Pamir which seeks to open awareness completely to every single point of the body foremost by the breath. By effect, emotions, feeling, and sensation is restored as well as the role each part may have.

A theatre term from Polish theatre director Jerzy Grotowski (1933 - 1999) expressing a poetic resonance linking humans, nature, senses, and cosmic elements.

In butoh, can be synonymous with the Subbody term life resonance.

An important butoh-fu creation by Tatsumi Hijikata where bugs gradually crawl on the body, giving the body a particular look that is a butoh trope though nothing to underestimate.

As shown in the Shadowbody YouTube found footage series known as Butoh in Real Life, certain characters can provoke or inspire the feeling of butoh.

Tatsumi Hijikata in his own butoh research was known to get inspiration from marginalized society. He was inspired by the sick or debilitated bodies he found not only in the Tokyo streets but the broken farmer bodies he recalled from his youth in the countryside.

These are characters that anybody can identify with in some way: (1) drunk body; (2) aged body; (3) baby body; (4) disabled body; (5) accident body; (6) sleep body; (7) possession body; (8) tantrum body

In Shadowbody, these are subtle movements that can be added to the body at any moment. They can begin the process of entering into a world or character and can also surface out of subconsciously-driven spontaneous movement.

They are: (1) vibration (micro and macro shaking); (2) sway; (3) wave; (4) twist (squirm); (5) shock (impulse, flick); (6) collapse (falls, micro falls); (7) expansion/contraction (stretch/shrink); (8) death (surrender, stillness)

A Shadowbody term for natural time, that is, of life's timing that doesn't have any set identifiable rhythm.

Think of the flight of a butterfly. Does the butterfly dance in a specific time like a ballet dancer? 5, 6, 7, 8? Butoh time has the following characteristics: (1) lack of rhythm; (2) nowness; (3) immediacy; (4) newness; (5) chaos.

Literal meaning is butoh notation.

The form of choreographic notation dependent on images or qualias.