Gesture, Abstraction and Embodied Simulation in Poetic Language

Abstract: The presentation examines the relation of embodied simulation with processes of self-awareness, consciousness and recognition within the phenomena of ‘literary identification’. I will study embodied images focusing on the verbal description of bodily interactions and gestures that are the experiential basis of such embodied images —that is, mental representations of the body and its interaction with the surroundings, and in which speech is grounded. Guillemette Bolens has fruitfully and extensively investigated this topic (The Style of Gestures, 2012; Kinesic Humor, 2021). My presentation, however, will focus on two (maximum four) poems.The main argument consists of assuming that the creative act is related to the representation of a subject’s movement and the subsequent identification of the self. Mental imagery of action, self-recognition, consciousness of actions, and imitation can be investigated by implementing models of action representation. However, the broader result of this study will be to try to provide literary evidence on imagined actions as a prototypical form of action representation. In the poetry by Maillard, the identification of specific percepts suggests that self-awareness constitutes a part of insinuated interactions —actions that appear incomplete or merely expected, and actions through which the lyric becomes aware of its own body and environment. Within a poem, such mental contents require a protagonist. A self around which the action is organized and extended towards others. And because there is action in a poem we don’t only find images but also movement. Making moving possible is one of the fundamental functions of the brain. Thus, this presentation is ultimately about the representation of the self in poetry by means of the notion of ‘proprioception’ in order to explore the expressions of self-consciousness in poetic texts. By observing body behavior in literary language, I will explore embodied cognition and self-awareness, underlining what the poetic representations of actions can tell us about the self. The analysis of the role of lyric actions in the construction of the self shall demonstrate how subjects become aware of their own movements, while they simultaneously describe the “lyric you” in terms of potential movements that do not belong to the first person. Expected and suggested actions are part of what multiplies the potential simulations. Consequently, we should also address self-awareness in terms of the tension between gesture and intention in poetry. This is a relevant material for imagination research because the perception of the self-motion in the lyric I illustrates how we build the expectation of the others’ action, and how the actions of others are conceived, simulated or understood by the subject.

Speaker: Víctor Bermúdez, Postdoctoral Research, Department of Literary Theory and Comparative Literature, University of Salamanca.
2022-03-18. 1600 UTC. Click here for your time zone.

Zoom workshop. One hour. Twenty-minute presentation by speaker, followed by questions and answers. For the zoom link, subscribe to our listserv or write to info@myrifield.org.