Apport de la danse-thérapie dans la prise en charge des victimes d’inceste

Objectives

Patients who are victims of incest frequently have body image disorders. My own experience as a dancer led me to formulate a hypothesis: ballroom dance could be useful for this population of patients to allow them to reclaim their bodies, to learn that their bodies are not their enemies, and that the body of others is not perceived as a danger. To do this, I wanted to trace the history of dance therapy and review the literature on dance therapy as a therapeutic intervention for victims of incest.

Methods

The confluence of dance and psychoanalysis will allow the emergence of dance therapy with three major figures in particular. First of all, Marian Chace and Dance Movement Therapy. She was a modern dancer who came to realize that her students come to her for much more than dance lessons. So, she began volunteering in a psychiatric hospital, where she ultimately became a paid staff member. She created a working group that was so successful that the patients themselves wanted to put on a show within the hospital. It was in 1940. She will officially become the first dancer-therapist in 1946. Next comes Trudi Schoop, who met Bleuler and worked mainly with schizophrenic patients. She used dance to harmonize body image and develop body awareness. Finally, Rose Gaetner, a French woman, trained as a psychomotor therapist, whose work focused primarily on classical dance with children and adolescents. The structuring side, mirror work, and the quest for beauty are for her a means of narcissistic restoration. It also introduces a very interesting concept: tonic dialogue.

Results

Today, dance therapy remains little known, especially in France, and its indications remain to be precisely defined, although studies have shown its effectiveness with both somatic and psychological pathologies. More specifically regarding dance therapy as a therapy for patients who are victims of incest, a review of the literature unfortunately brought up only eight studies on the subject. The protocols are very diverse and somewhat lacking in solidity. However, all these studies tend to show the effectiveness of dance therapy with this specific population.

Discussion

It is very interesting to note that dance has always been part of humanity. From the Paleolithic, we find traces of it with “the dancing sorcerer,” and it is very possible that it was used for therapeutic purposes. These were most likely trance dances, but these dances have persisted until today, whether it is the Neapolitan Tarantella, Breton dances, or even voodoo. We also find the same characteristics in rave parties. These dances often have an aspect of treatment, particularly for psychological disorders. We can then wonder if rave parties do not also respond to a need in the face of societal unhappiness. Dance therapy was born during the first part of the 20th century, during the era of asylum psychiatry, when the first psychotropic drugs had not yet been discovered and psychoanalysis had just been born. In the 19th century, dance was very codified and showing one's emotions was immodest. Dance strove to show beauty and technique was at the service of aesthetics. Two dancers will create the break: Nijinsky with “The Rite of Spring” and Isadora Duncan. Modern dance shows everything–the body, the emotions–and wants to be closer to its audience. From there, the dance will continue to evolve with trends approaching so-called “primitive” dances, for example. At the same time, psychoanalysis blossomed, obviously first and foremost with Freud and his theory of the Ego. For him, the Ego is not totally separated from the body, since for him there exists a kind of “corporeal Ego” “derived from bodily sensations”. Adler, for his part, advocated the indivisibility of the human being; in other words, mind and body cannot be separated. Finally, Jung described “active imagination,” a method of introspection by which the individual voluntarily dives into his imagination to access his unconscious. Movement being an expression of the unconscious, allowing movement from the imagination is accessing the unconscious.

Conclusion

Dance therapy was born in the mid-20th century from the confluence of psychoanalysis and modern dance, to evolve into different currents. Too few studies have been conducted on the practice of dance therapy in patients who are victims of incest, although it seems to be of interest. It therefore seems necessary to conduct other studies.