Ponum dance to feature at California dance therapy conference
Clara Reyes and Jonathan van Arneman will present Sint Maarten’s Ponum dance as a case study at a California conference.
Clara Reyes and Jonathan van Arneman will present Sint Maarten’s traditional Ponum dance at the 61st Annual American Dance Therapy Association Conference in Long Beach, California, beginning Thursday 5 November. Speaking on the government’s Inside Government radio programme, they said their presentation, titled Culture to Clinic, will use the dance as a case study to examine whether cultural traditions can inform therapeutic practice.
Van Arneman, a traumatic grief counsellor in Philadelphia, said the presentation will set out a multi-step model for examining traditional practices before considering whether elements may have clinical applications. He said the purpose is not to encourage therapists to adopt the Ponum itself, and that research and professional evaluation would be needed before any Ponum-based intervention could be treated as established psychotherapy.
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Reyes said the Ponum is connected to Sint Maarten’s history of enslavement, resistance and emancipation. She said her research included interviews with elderly residents and documentation work during the 1990s, after she had seen the dance in the early 1980s. Reyes said the dance preserves memories of liberation, including events surrounding the 1848 abolition of slavery on the French side and abolition on the Dutch side in 1863.
According to Reyes and Van Arneman, the conference session will examine the dance’s history, social context, movement patterns and cultural meaning. Participants will also be introduced to elements of its movement vocabulary, including its relationship between singing, drumming and dancing.
Van Arneman said he is interested in examining possible therapeutic applications in Sint Maarten in the future, including for people dealing with trauma, grief and cultural identity. He said he is not using the traditional dance in its complete form with Sint Maarten clients.
File photo: Richie Diesterheft / Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 2.0 · cropped, SXM Today mark added
