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Original Embodied Knowledge the epistemology of the new in dancepractice as researchAnna Pakes aaSchool of the Arts (Dance Department), Roehampton University of Surrey, Roehampton Lane,London SW15 5PJ, UK (e-mail: [email protected]).

To cite this ArticlePakes, Anna(2003) 'Original Embodied Knowledge: the epistemology of the new in dance practice asresearch', Research in Dance Education, 4: 2, 127 149

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Research in Dance Education

Vol. 4, No. 2, December 2003

Original Embodied Knowledge: theepistemology of the new in dance practice

as research

ANNA PAKES, School of the Arts (Dance Department), RoehamptonUniversity of Surrey, Roehampton Lane, London SW15 5PJ, UK(e-mail: [email protected])

ABSTRACT Many UK universities now recognise that artistic practice can constitute a

form of research in its own right; increasingly, practising artists are sponsored or

employed to work creatively within the academy, whilst the regulatory frameworks of

research degree programmes have evolved to enable practical doctoral submissions.

These developments have raised a number of complex epistemological issues, including

the problem of what constitutes original investigation in an art domain. This article

explores this issue in relation to dance practice presented as doctoral research. It

explores what originality means in this context and how it is or can be assessed. The

article also examines whether, in an emerging discipline like dance, there is sufficientlybroad consensus about the existing knowledge-base to furnish a background for judging

the new. Aesthetic theory and the philosophy of education are discussed in the attempt

to unravel and clarify key issues. An analysis of existing institutional discourse seeks to

identify the logical parameters and conceptual grounding of current practice, and to

open a dialogue between philosophical perspectives and those involved in practice as

research.

As performing arts departments in UK universities have developed over the last few

decades, the scope of the research activities they house has widened. The creation andperformance of dance, theatre or music have increasingly come to be recognised as

forms of research in their own right. [1] Growing numbers of practising artists have

joined university departments to continue their creative work within the academys

walls. [2] And the regulatory frameworks of research degree programmes have evolved

to enable practical, or at least part-practical, doctoral submissions. [3] This implies

many universities acceptance in principle of the equivalence between artistic practice as

research and other, more traditional (scientific or humanities-based) research models

of the idea that successful examples of each conform to existing definitions or normative

conceptions of what research should be. [4]

Such definitions invariably turn on the idea of research as an originalcontribution toknowledge within the particular subject domain. A survey conducted by the UK Council

ISSN 1464-7893 (print)/ISSN 1470-1111 (online)/03/02012723 2003 Taylor & Francis Ltd

DOI: 10.1080/1464789032000130354


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128 A. Pakes

for Graduate Education (UKCGE) identified a broad consensus amongst higher edu-

cation institutions offering practice-based degrees that doctoral submissions should

furnish new knowledge and/or a new perspective on existing knowledge (UKCGE,

1997a, p. 14). This expectation is enshrined in PhD regulations across the country,

which broadly concur with UKCGEs own, more detailed characterisation of whatconstitutes doctoral level work:

doctorateness involves mastery of the existing techniques and knowledge-

base of the subject, a critical and analytical attitude towards them, an ability

to apply them with a view to originating new knowledge and/or understand-

ing and an abilitybased on the aboveto originate in the form of a

contribution which is judged to be valid and significant. (UKCGE, 1997a,

p. 14)

According to this definition, newness is assessed against the background of a fields

established knowledge-base and judged in relation to the disciplines methodologicalstandards (that is, offset against the requirement for methodological rigour). Originality

also features as a prominent theme within the Quality Assurance Agency (QAA)

descriptors for postgraduate qualifications, indeed is identified as a feature even of

Masters-level work. According to the QAA guidelines, Masters-level students are

expected to have shown originality in the application of knowledge and in tackling

problems. The stakes are further raised for doctoral-level candidates, who are expected

to be involved in the creation and interpretation of knowledge, which extends the

forefront of a discipline, usually through original research; they should be able to carry

through, from design to completion, projects for the generation of significant new

knowledge and/or understanding; and they should show innovation in tackling and

solving problems (QAA, 2001). Guidelines attaching to the 1996 and 2001 Research

Assessment Exercises (RAE) also emphasise originality as a key factor, suggesting that

qualifying submissions will include: the invention and generation of ideas, images,

performances and artefacts, including design, where these lead to new or substantially

improved insights or the experimental use of existing knowledge to produce new or

substantially improved materials, devices, products and processes (RAE, 2001, my

italics). The originality requirement clearly cuts across the institutional contexts of both

doctoral and university staff research.

To qualify for institutional recognition (and funding) as research, then, dance practicemust be original and innovative. But what is an original investigation within choreogra-

phy or performance, assuming that both might qualify as forms of research? What

constitutes new knowledge in these fields? The UKCGE and QAA definitions suggest

that any purportedly new contribution be offset against what the discipline already

knows. But is there sufficiently broad consensus about the knowledge-base peculiar to

dance for this to furnish a background against which to judge the new? And is there

disciplinary agreement over not just what is known, but how it is known, i.e. concerning

the viability and rigour of particular methods of investigation? The originality require-

ment seems likely to be contentious within any academic discipline, given that interpre-

tations as to what is new or ground-breaking might vary dramatically from one groupof scholars to the next. But it is perhaps particularly controversial within an emerging


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Original Embodied Knowledge 129

academic discipline like dance, where the epistemological ground is still contested and

shifting. What is more, the dual nature of dance as bothacademic disciplineandartistic

practice seems to complicate the originality issue. It raises questions as to whether

originality is the same thing from both artistic and research perspectives, and whether

the research-based investigation or its product is supposed to be original. What, indeed,is the product of an enquiry conducted through practicean artwork or the knowledge

it makes available? Are these distinguishable from one another?

There are, then, a number of complex problems raised by the framing of practice as

research. Some of these issues are already the subject of lively debate within communi-

ties of artists, academics and researcher-practitioners. In the visual arts, where there are

longer-standing precedents for recognising practice as a form of research, a body of

literature exists charting a range of positions on the relation between knowledge and

artistic creation (see, for example, Alison 1994; Newbury 1996; Painter, 1996; Candlin,

2000, 2001). In the performing arts, the Practice as Research in Performance (PARIP)

project and journals such as Studies in Theatre and Performance have hosted andpublished extensive discussions within this still developing field (see, for example,

Piccini, 2002; Thomson, 2003). Such discussions have highlighted a need for epistemo-

logical enquiry which explores the validity, methods and scope of performative

knowledge (Adams, in Thomson, 2003, p. 175; see also Piccini, in Thomson, 2003,

p. 161; Piccini, 2002). As yet, however, there is little sustained philosophical investiga-

tion of practice as research in the public domain. There is also a paucity of reflection

on the problems specific to dance practice as research, critical debates within the

performing arts to date usually centring on other types of performance practice.

My aim in this article is to begin to explore epistemological issues surrounding dance

practice presented as research. This article draws on aesthetic theory and the philosophy

of education in the effort to unravel and clarify, even if I cannot resolve, some of the

problems. The discussion focuses in particular on the philosophical implications of the

originality requirement, that is, on the expectation that practical research furnish an

original contribution to knowledge. I have restricted the articles focus mainly to PhD

research for a number of reasons. Firstly, this makes sense with regard to my particular

focus: within the UKs qualifications framework, it is at doctoral level that the

originality requirement really begins to be articulated and upheld as a criterion of value

and validity which distinguishes higher-level research from undergraduate and Masters-

level work. Secondly, the critical debates referred to above have tended to date to focuslargely on general issues not always directly relevant to the doctoral context; [5] there

is thus scope for developing a reflection particularly pertinent to practice as research at

PhD level. Finally, in comparison with university staff research, PhD programmes

generally have tighter assessment structures and regulatory frameworks. This means

that the discourses establishing such structures have to articulate how practice as

research stands up against the fixed set of paradigms of traditional research (Piccini,

2002) in a way that is not always necessary in post-doctoral contexts. Analysing this

institutional discourse exposes the logic of these structures and the extent of the

consensual understanding underpinning them. The article takes this kind of analytical

epistemological, rather than an empirical, approach. I am not proposing to surveyexisting practice and draw theoretical conclusions from it so much as to explore existing


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130 A. Pakes

discourse about practice as research in terms of its logical parameters and conceptual

grounding.

Originality in Art and Research

It may be useful as a starting point to examine some of the different senses of the term

originality as it is used in relation to art. This will establish a basis from which to

compare and contrast originality in artistic practice as research. Bailey (1992) confirms

that the word has a range of meanings and designates a complex concept. His discussion

suggests that an artwork may be original in a number of ways. It may be:

(1) the first token of a design type;

(2) the first object to contain specific artistic properties;

(3) the first in a set of objects created in a style specific to an individual artist.;

(4) the first object to show known content in the way that it does;

(5) the first object to present previously unknown information. [6]

In cases (1), (2) and (3), originality is a question of the objects relationship with the

wider artworld or art historical context. [7] One would need to set the object against

the background of other artworks to judge if it is thefirsttoken of a design/artistic type,

manifestation of particular artistic properties or work in a particular style. Dance

practice as research might, it seems, be original in any of these first three senses. For

example, a choreographer completing a PhD might: propose a new type of multimedia

performance as in (1); he/she might submit choreography which develops movement

material of unprecedented complexity, which has a highly unusual effect on the

audience (2); or he/she might present a work which establishes an idiosyncratic

movement language which stands alongside those of other established practitioners as

a distinctive and significant style (3). In each of these examples, the judgement that the

submission was original would rest on comparisons with other works in the dance

tradition and on the current dance scene. The object in categories (1), (2) and (3) is

adjudged original in terms of its relation to the field ofart, or (more specifically) dance

art.

Objects that are original in senses (4) and (5) are rather different. These categories

highlight the newness of the objects cognitive content rather than its artistic originality

per se: either the object is the first to show known content in the way it does, or itpresents previously unknown information. An original object in sense (4) might be one

in a series of artistic representations of the content concerned: perhaps there are

paintings, sculptures, poems or digital animations which explore similar issues to those

examined in or through the new dance work. In this case, one would judge whether the

dance is original by comparing it with those other artistic representations, and so again

in terms of an art history or artworld context. But equally an object in sense (4) might

be exploring issues that have not been examined in any artwork to date: perhaps the

issue the choreographer is tackling has been discussed at length in philosophical texts

but never through art or dance. In this case, the framework against which the objects

originality is judged seems broader, since it also incorporates the other media ofrepresentation or discussion: the dance works manifestation of the content is compared


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with the way, say, philosophers discuss the issue in order to see what is different or

interesting about the way dance handles these ideas. A broader framework also seems

to be involved in judging a category (5) object, that is, an object which presents

previously unknown information. The value of some dance practice as research, for

example, might be the new knowledge it makes available about human experience, thebody or proprioceptive awareness, rather than the innovations it effects in artistic terms.

Here, the objects value as original seems to derive from the relation between its

cognitive content and the existing stock of knowledge in general, rather than only or

necessarily artistic knowledgealthough it might also convey new information that

belongs specifically to the art domain. [8] So objects in categories (1), (2) and (3) seem

to display specifically artistic originality; those in (4) and (5) may be artistically original,

but might equally be original in a different sense.

As suggested above, it seems that dance practice as research might fall into any of

these five categories of original object. But does the discourse surrounding practice as

research accept this, or are some kinds of originality privileged over others as appropri-ate to the PhD or post-doctoral situations? UKCGE defines a practice-based doctorate

as one that includes an original creative work, itself held to demonstrate originality,

mastery and contribution to the field (1997b, p. 3). Originality here could be inter-

preted as emphasising either artistic innovation or innovation in presenting a particular

cognitive content. The idea that the work contributes to a field is similarly ambiguous.

Initially, it seems to privilege those objects which make available a new cognitive

content or frame existing knowledge in a new way; it is easier to conceptualise that

content as an addition to the stock of knowledge in the domain, in the way the term

contribution suggests. But one might argue that the field of dance as an academic

discipline, like its artworld context, is actually constituted by knowledge of the art

forms history and current directions as well as understanding of its core medium or

media (see also below). Any new work judged original against this backdrop would be

both artistically original and generative of new ideas. From this perspective, a dance

works originality as research and its originality as art amount to the same thing.

Yet it also seems problematic to treat originality in art and in research as equivalent.

This has been recognised in the debate over practice as research in the performing arts.

Kershaw (2001), for example, highlights the need to define carefully [t]he differences

between aesthetic innovation, and the uses of such innovation placed at the service of

explicit research agendas designed to produce new knowledge or insights (p. 146),although he does not explicitly rule out artistic originality as a quality of practice as

research. Discussions at the Practice as Research in Performance (PARIP) symposium at

Bristol University in November 2001 were more emphatic on this issue. Piccini (2002)

reports one groups concern to uphold the distinction between practice as research and

artistic practice per se. Whereas artists might remain unaware or only dimly cognisant

of their works relation to the wider context, it was considered paramount that

practitioner-researchers explicitly identify and justify their contribution to knowledge.

The group argued that practice as research should obey the norms of scholarly research

practice, in which the claim to new knowledge is made explicit in a commentary or

abstract, supported by the academic apparatus of bibliography, abstract, literaturereview, citations, etc. (Piccini, 2002). The group also maintained the need for research


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132 A. Pakes

to produce a set of separable, demonstrable, research findings that are abstractable, not

simply locked into the experience of performing.

This indicates that the cognitive content of the creative work was considered by the

PARIP group to be crucial to its status as research rather than its artistry per se. Or at

least, that the onus is on the researcher to develop a self-conscious awareness of whatthe cognitive content of their work is. Even if the knowledge produced belongs to the

art or dance domain, originality is not simply a question of pushing forward the

boundaries of the art form but of treating the intervention as contributing to our

understanding of art or dance. The UKCGE report (1997a) similarly suggests that

artwork must be explicitly intended as research by the creator in order to qualify; the

artist needs an academic research perspective if he/she wishes to present the outcome

of his/her process as part of a PhD submission. Again, the suggestion is that the

artist-researcher needs to be self-consciously engaged in generating knowledge rather

than just innovating artistically. As Kleiman (in Thomson, 2003) suggests, the aca-

demic context is one in which any claim that the work carries serious intellectual andtheoretical weight, and makes a valuable contribution to the furtherance of knowledge,

etc., needs to be evidenced and verified (p. 172). UKCGE (1997a) seems to support this

view but alsoproblematicallygoes on to suggest that the creative work must itself

be valid and original [] and of high quality as art (p. 14). This ambiguity about

whether practice as research has to demonstrate artistic innovation or originality in

cognitive terms is yet to be resolved. [9]

There are other conceptual problems with the originality requirement beyond the

kind of innovation expected of practice as research. As Bailey (1992) points out, the

term original has an honorific rather than simply classificatory sense. However the

term is understood, it is assumed to enhance an objects artistic value. But how original

does an artwork or a piece of practice as research need to be in order to be valued as

a significant contribution? One (extreme) answer would be to claim that only works

representing turning points in art history are truly original: that something is art only

if it has a unique place in art history, a place something has only if it constitutes a

turning point in art history (Bailey, 1992, p. 315). As Bailey points out, this is clearly

a problematic claim with respect to artworks since not all objects currently recognised

as such represent turning points in art history. To argue that they should would be to

consider only works like Duchamps Fountain (1917), Picassos Guernica (1937) or

Nijinskis LApres-Midi dun Faune (1912) true art, and relegate other less innovativecreations to a kind of sub-art status. This seems to push the criterion of originality too

far. If one extends the parallel with practice as research, the requirement appears even

more extreme. It is unreasonable to expect all artwork to have the original force or

impact of Guernica, let alone all practice as research submissions. In the research

context, this would be like expecting all PhDs in philosophy to be as significant for the

field as Descartes Meditations (16411642), WittgensteinsPhilosophical Investigations

(1958) or Derridas Of Grammatology (French original, 1967). Presumably artistic

knowledge, like knowledge in other fields, can develop through people taking small

steps as well as great leaps.

If overestimating how far an artistic intervention must advance beyond its predeces-sors results in absurdity, the other extreme of the same scale seems equally implausible:


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134 A. Pakes

debate. The Board has to decide who or what to fund, not whether the outcomes of the

chosen projects ultimately do constitute a contribution to the field. This is rather

different to the situation in which the validity of a PhD is being assessed, although not

necessarily to the activity of processing a PhD or upgrading application. [12] It is

difficult to see how a PhDs claim to originality could be made at the proposal stageexcept through the clear articulation of questions rather than definite outcomes. In any

other discipline, it would not be expected of a PhD candidate that they predetermine the

findings but that they clarify the hypotheses. Similarly, it would be unreasonable to

expect the dance practitioner-researcher to give a clear indication of the shape of the

work when the process is still in its initial stages; they can, however, say what they are

investigating and why. But this does shift the emphasis of the originality requirement;

it suggests that the questions or investigation as such should be original rather than

necessarily (or in addition to) the outcome.

Creative Processes and Original Products

Indeed, UKCGE (1997a) argues that even the final assessment of a practice-based PhD

must take into account the process of investigation and creation involved. Citing a

University of Central England document on research in art and design, the UKCGE

report distinguishes between the artist-researcher and the artist as such on this basis:

[w]hereas an artist or designer can simply present his or her end-product, and refuse

further explanation, the academic art and design researcher is obliged also to map for

his or her peers the route by which they arrived at that product (1997a, p. 13). This

obligation is reiterated and further explicated a few pages later:

The processthe programme of research and the research methods fol-

lowedcan be distinguished from the productthe outcome of the re-

searchalthough the product is a significant indicator of the process. The

determination of doctorateness depends on the exposition of both [] no

matter how valuable or well received in artistic terms the product is, this is

not, in itself, indicative of the process. (UKCGE, 1997a, p. 21)

The report goes on to argue for the pivotal role played by a verbal, written commen-

tary on the work in providing a record of the process, essential to assessing the

attainment of a doctoral award (p. 22). Again, it is clear that creating artisticallyoriginal artwork is not considered sufficient to meet the criteria of validity for practice-

based doctorates. Access also needs to be provided to the route whereby that work was

generated, to the process of which it is the outcome.

UKCGE (1997a) makes an exception in the case of music, where, in a long

established tradition of compositional doctorates, a consensus has been reached among

the academics that the product (namely the composition) embodies and, in consequence,

is indicative of the research process and [] this is clearly understood by the academic

community (p. 23). In musical composition, there is an established notation system

generally and consensually regarded as an essentially accurate record of the composers

work. This gives the latter a permanence (and hence allows for close analysis andrepeated re-readings) that works in the other performing arts do not have. The script of


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136 A. Pakes

argues that the creative artist does not begin with a clear image or plan of the final result

of his work. But there is a sense of the activity as directed, as heading somewhere: even

if the artist cannot say precisely which way he/she is going, he/she can adjudge certain

directions not to be the right ones. It is this exercise of critical judgement [that] sets

creative activity apart from activity that is acquiescent to the leadership of revery(p. 376). The process of artistic creation is not controlled teleologically in terms of a

preconceived end, but it is regulated by the rigorous critical scrutiny operating at each

stage in the production.

Tomas account of the creative process is convincing in that it seems to strike an

appropriate balance between the intuitive, imaginative dimension of creative activity

and its elements of technical, rational and critical control (c.f. Best, 1985, 1987b). Does

Tomas characterisation also help elucidate the process of dance practitioner-researcher

engaged in original research? According to the perspectives outlined above, a prac-

titioner-researcher does or should have a clear sense of the purpose or goal of the

investigation. UKCGE (1997a) argues that the academic research perspective will beembedded in the makers intentions, which suggests at least a negative definition of what

the outcome will be: not simply a dance work, to be assessed on its own terms, in

relation to its aesthetic and/or artistic merit. Also, AHRB (2002) states and UKCGE

(1997a) implies that the practitioners research questions must be clearly defined at the

outset, which seems to work against Tomas idea that the artistic process has no clear

goal in sight. But then can aquestionfunction as a preconceived end in any very definite

sense? Not, one suspects, as long as it remains the question rather than also the findings

that are formulated in advance. Both artistic practice and research practice seem

radically different to the kind of technical process which produces an outcome in exact

accordance with a predetermined specification. Artistic and research processes would

appear much more aleatory and much less predictable than their technical counterparts,

even if a focus for the investigation is identified at the beginning.

UKCGE (1997a) elaborates this point in justifying its claims about the importance of

assessing process as well as product. The report argues that qualitative methods are far

more likely to be prevalent than their quantitative counterparts within research in the

arts disciplines. This, the report claims (in contrast to the AHRBs injunction that artists

clearly identify research questions), is because arts research does not, typically, begin

with a predetermined set of questions or assumptions but arises from particular

situations or contexts (p. 22). The emphasis is on situations in their particularity ratherthan the universality or generalisability of either hypotheses or conclusions. And this

chimes with Tomas idea that artists may change the direction of their exploration at

any point, in response to the particular circumstances that have arisen at this stage in

the making processor in other words (and in a non-pejorative sense) make up the

rules as they go along. The parallel thus seems to hold between the rule-generating artist

and the researcher generating new insight through original investigation; these figures

contrast respectively with the rule-following, goal-oriented agent and the student

rehearsing existing knowledge. The problem with extending that parallel in this respect,

however, is that the possibility of making up the rules as one goes along seems in tension

with the requirement for methodological rigour. Researchersparticularly PhD candi-datesare expected to know about and employ methods recognised as valid in their


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field. Indeed, as the UKCGE (1997a) discussion continues, it becomes clear that the

record of the process is considered important not so much because it gives insight into

the originality of the investigation, as because it ensures that the work is valued,

understood and assessed as an outcome of a rigorous and intellectually demanding

programme of study, which would otherwise be difficult to determine (p. 22). Thedocument, then, proves that the methods are viable and that the process of investigation

has been systematic.

One could, of course, argue that the artists exercise of critical judgement is itself the

mechanism for ensuring rigour in the kind of process Tomas describes. Subjecting ones

creative work to critical scrutiny implies the imposition of distance between maker and

object, which allows the work as it is progressing to be tested against received ideas and

artistic and/or cognitive criteria at each significant stage. The exercise of critical

judgement appears similar to the process whereby the findings of scientific researchin-

cluding both the data generated and the inductive generalisations proceeding from

themare rigorously and continuously scrutinised. Tomas idea that the artist (and byextension the practitioner-researcher) can say what is not right even if he/she does not

know what is, seems reminiscent of the principle of falsifiability in scientific research, as

formulated by Popper (1980). [18] The traditional view of scientific knowledge is that

experience gradually accumulates until a general principle can be derived that the

experience verifies. Popper, meanwhile, argues that science abounds in hypotheses

which precede and are tested against experience; those that withstand the test constitute

scientific knowledge, although there is always the possibility that they may be falsified

by a particular eventuality arising in the future. [19] Thus:

what characterises the empirical method is its manner of exposing tofalsification, in every conceivable way, the system to be tested. Its aim is not

to save the lives of untenable systems but, on the contrary, to select the one

which is by comparison the fittest, by exposing them all to the fiercest struggle

for survival. (Popper, 1980, p. 42)

The process is parallel to the creative process described by Tomas: the evolving artwork

is exposed to rigorous critical scrutiny and particular directions rejected if they fail this

test. The work that emerges at the end of the process is that which has withstood the

critical gaze of the artist-researcher. [20]

Suggestive as Tomas account of the creative process is, however, it has been criticisedby other aestheticians working on the topic of creativity. In fact, his position (and that

of other philosophers who develop comparable forms of Creative-Process Theory) is

vigorously refuted by Glickman (1978). Glickman points out that there is nothing

distinctive about the kind of process Tomas considers peculiar to the creative artist,

indeed that Tomas crucial error lies in the assumption that creativity consists in some

distinctive pattern of thought and/or activity (p. 146). In assessing whether or not an

artist is creative, Glickman maintains, we do not trace the artists process of making and

point to the moments where he/she appears also to be creating. We look at the product

he/she has produced and assess it in relation to other works in the canon. Thus, the verb

create does not designate a specific, isolable form of activity. Rather, it operates as(using Gilbert Ryles terminology) an achievement verb. The measure of the achieve-


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138 A. Pakes

ment is in the relationship between this work and a broader context of such practice,

not in the link between the particular artistic process and its product. Glickmans

position here is similar to that argued by Best (1987a): [t]he product, not some []

inner process is what gives sense to the notion of creative choreography (p. 33). Best

also points out the tension, if not contradiction, between the very notion of creativityand the idea of an identifiable set of steps, principles or rules characteristic of creative

processes: to be creative is to do something originalwhich in some sense transcends or

even changes the rules (p. 30).

Tomas perhaps escapes this charge of self-contradiction by offering only a negative

characterisation of the creative processs rules or principles. Tomas is not trying to

suggest that there is a series of steps that the theorist can identify and the artist follow

in order to produce creative work. Rather, he is identifying a critical logic which comes

into play in assessing each stage of the developing artistic product. In this respect,

Tomas perspective may be relevant to the practitioner-researcher because it explicates

one way in which methodical rigour can be assured without compromising the intuitivedevelopment of a creative work: namely, precisely through that critical judgement which

is an integral part of the creative process anyway. Defining methodical constraints

negatively in this way has the advantage of not imposing from outside a set of

parameters which, in their externality, destroy the coherence of the creative process. As

concerns the question of judging the arts originality, however, Glickmans and Bests

position seems intuitively right. Otherwise there is too much focus on what the

artist-researcher aimed to do and how he/she went about it rather than what he/she

actually did. But what this discussion does highlight is the need to recognise the different

kinds of claims to originality that must be made by the researcher at different stages in

their process. At the proposal stage, original questions need defining that have the scope

to lead to new knowledge or understanding. And yet these must not determine in

advance the precise nature of the outcome: if they did, the research itself would be

superfluous. The accompanying documentation of the final submission then focuses (at

least in part) on the research outcome in relation to the artworld context and/or other

field of knowledge, to demonstrate the originality of the outcome. The examiners assess

that claim to originality against their own understanding of artistic and knowledge

contexts, with the viva voce providing an opportunity to justify apparent omissions and

to resolve differences between competing judgements.

Where questions, investigation and outcome are all original in the examiners view,there seems to be no problem. But what of situations where the questions and processes

were original but the artwork produced is not, even though it is a valid response to the

questions? [21] Can such a project still be awarded a PhD? Again, the answer would

partly depend on whether artistic originality or innovation in knowledge is expected

from the candidate. It is possible to imagine a researcher asking new questions and

formulating relevant answers, but through a work that does not actually look original

in any significant sense. UKCGE seems to argue against awarding the qualification in

such cases, by including the suggestion that the artwork as such must be original as well

as any knowledge it makes available (UKCGE 1997a, p. 5; see above, p. 128). But this

opens the door to all the problems with artistic originality as a criterion of valueidentified in the discussion above (pp. 128129). On this basis one might be tempted to


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narrow down the originality requirement in PhD contexts at least, to a requirement for

new knowledge rather than artistic originality. Unfortunately, as suggested in the

introduction, this too creates difficulties, especially in the case of a relatively young

discipline like dance. The epistemological ground here is still contested and shifting, a

phenomenon compounded by the trend within the arts and humanities towards increas-ing interdisciplinaritylike the rug being pulled from under those only just beginning

to find their feet. And yet how can new knowledge be identified without a clear sense

of what the field already knows?

Dance Knowledges: knowing how, practical wisdom & dance understanding

So what is the knowledge-base specific to the dance field and what kinds of new

knowledge might practice as research contribute to it? A number of philosophers of

education have addressed the first of these questions. Best (1974, 1985), McFee (1992,

1994) and Carr (1978, 1986, 1999) have all explored the epistemological distinctivenessof dance in order to argue its academic validity and importance within school and

university curricula. Their work is primarily focused on legitimising the place of dance

in primary, secondary and undergraduate educational contexts, and so does not address

explicitly or in detail the question of dance research. [22] But the ideas of Best, Carr and

McFee offer one route whereby the knowledges embodied in dance practice can begin

to be identified and explored. They may therefore help flesh out the background against

which the originality of the new contributions to the field furnished by practice-based

research can be measured. Clearly dance practice conceived as artistic practice is not

primarily geared towards the generation of factual knowledge in the way that, for

example, scientific as well as historical research can be. [23] So, if the originality of

dance practice as research is not (or not primarily) in its discovery of new facts, where

does it lie?

Carr (e.g. 1978, 1987b), Best (1985) and McFee (1994) all assert the status of dance

as rational human action. Indeed, their argument for the educational legitimacy of dance

rests on their claim for its rationality. Carr (1999) explains this focus as a response to

the liberal traditionalism dominating post-war analytic philosophy of education: if

education was conceived as a matter of initiation into rational modes of human enquiry

and activity, the educational value of practical activities would need to be justified by

showing how reason is implicated no less in skilled conduct than in theoretical oracademic enquiry (p. 124). But Carr and his colleagues are also concerned with how

other forms of reason than the purely theoretical are embedded in the practice and

appreciation of dance. Their work thus poses a challenge (sometimes implicitly,

sometimes explicitly) to the tradition of Western epistemology, which has typically

focused on a conception of knowledge as justified true belief (Alcoff, 1998, p. viii). The

idea that knowledge is essentially factual and/or theoretical leaves other ways of

knowing out of account. Carr, Best and McFee work in an alternative tradition,

reaching back at least as far as Aristotle, which rejects the narrowness of this traditional

conception.

Carrs early work (1978, 1984), for example, explores the relevance to dance of thedistinction between knowing how and knowing that. [24] Most famously explicated by


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140 A. Pakes

Gilbert Ryle (1949), knowing how is a question of being able to perform tasks

intelligentlya form of knowledge that epistemological philosophy has neglected

because of its focus on knowledgethat. Carr (1978) recognises Ryles contribution, but

draws more from Aristotle, Von Wright, Kenny and Anscombe in elaborating the idea

of practical reasoning or practical inference as the logic of knowing how (1978, p. 5).[25] Carrs early work maintains that this logic is clearly manifest in the skills acquired

by pupils in dance education. According to this argument, if I learn how to perform a

balletenchanement, my performance demonstrates the knowledge how I have acquired.

This includes the ability to execute the relevant steps in the right order with a feeling

for their dynamic qualities and coherence as a sequence. The intelligence of my

performance consists in the practical understanding and reasoning that are part and

parcel of actually dancing the enchanementwell. That intelligence is not a function of

a logically antecedent theoretical understanding that I then put into practice, or that

practice then effectsit is embedded in the action itself. But, for Carr, knowing how

is also to be distinguished from simply being able to do. As a teacher, I might no longerbe able to perform the sequence, but I can still know how to do it. Equally, someone

who has not been trained in the relevant skills might happen to perform the sequence

effectively but without any understanding of what he/she was actually doing; in this

case, one would not say they know how to perform this enchanementeven though they

have shown an ability to do it.

It seems possible, and potentially fruitful, to extend this argument to incorporate

practice as research as a way of developing knowledge how. The crucially relevant

and, from the practitioner-researchers point of view, appealinginsight is the idea that

practice itself embodies and develops a form of knowledge, rather than simply offering

a physical demonstration of a pre-theorised intellectual position (c.f. Rye, 2001). But

there are also problems with the idea of knowledge how in relation to practice as

research. Firstly, if there is a distinction between knowing how and being able to do,

then the assessment of practice as research would need to be able to distinguish cases

of intelligentfrom other kinds of performance. One would have to look at the reasoning

embedded in performance rather than just performance itself; and so this reasoning

would have to be articulated in some way other than through the action, since

performance of the action need not be intelligent. Again, then, there seems to be a need

for a commentary or reflection of some kind on the practice. This is not necessarily a

problem, but would be if one considers that such commentary will be bound to distortand alter the character of the knowledge embedded in the performance itself (Rye,

2001). Equally, the question arises as to whether it is unreasonable to expect students

to disseminate their knowledge through two different routes (c.f. Hockey & Allen-

Collinson, 2000). The second issue relates to the fact that knowledge how is heavily

dependent on the existence of established norms of action: one reasons practically about

how to perform a pre-defined action in terms of norms which suggest how best that goal

can be achieved (Kenny, 1966). So knowledge how appears equivalent to the technical

knowledge which can produce a desired outcome in accordance with a predetermined

specification (see above, pp. 131132). There seems little room in this account for

innovation or originality. The idea of knowing how might explain the kind of reasoningembodied in the intelligent performance of a pirouette or the creation of a dance work


16/25


that obeys predefined compositional principles. Neither of these activities would qualify

as practice-based research under any of the definitions explored so far. Carr himself

recognises the normative bias of knowledge how as a problem with his early position.

The latter can only account for the acquisition of fairly routine or habitual tech-

niquesstaying well clear of the less predictable creative and imaginative aspects ofdance practice (1999, p. 126).

Carrs (1987a) essay tries to rectify early omissions by arguing that dancers and artists

would need two other kinds of knowledge in addition to procedural knowledge of dance

technique: first, a knowledge of the conventions of a particular artistic genre; second,

a grasp of more objective naturalistically grounded rules of aesthetic-affective associ-

ation (1999, p. 128). This is similar to the idea examined above (p. 5) that the

knowledge-base of dance involves understanding of the art forms history, of the current

state of artistic exploration and of the core medium (including the range and potential

of that mediums aesthetic impact on the audience). But Carr subsequently critiques also

this idea, arguing that this way of explaining what students and dance artists docreatively places a quite bizarre rationalist or technicist construction on the rationality

of dance performance (1999, p. 128). It suggests that in creating a choreography, one

begins with an idea [], one interprets the idea within the terms of a particular set of

conventions [], one checks the performance against a list of general aesthetic criteria

[]finally devising a repertoire of movement appropriately expressive of the theme

(p. 128). This, Carr argues, smuggles back in the notion of there necessarily being a

pre-existing theoretical basis for practical action, a myth that he and Ryle were trying

to explode. And it thereby also destroys the potential of the knowledge how idea to

explain how practice itselfcan be valued as developing original insight. It suggests that

the practitioner-researcher has the idea, draws on the methods considered viable in the

field of dance art and produces a work which is tested against accepted aesthetic/artistic

criteria. Neither the practical nature nor the originality of practice as research is really

foregrounded in such a schema.

And yet this conception seems in some ways very close to what is advocated in the

documentation on practice as research examined earlier. Again, there is a tension

between the requirements of originality and rigour. It seems that dance practice has to

justify itself, its questions and the directions of its processes in terms of the fields

already constituted knowledge-base. It does this by reflecting on its place in relation to

the history and current preoccupations of the dance scene. But the danger is that thisreflection compromises the distinctiveness of the knowledge such practice itself devel-

ops, transforming knowledge how into a species of theoretical understanding. Carrs

most recent solution to this dilemma (although he is discussing dance in general not

practice as research) is to explore Aristotles concept ofphronesis, or practical wisdom,

to identify a form of knowledge that is neither simply theoretical nor exclusively

technical. [26] Developed through the experience of art, phronetic insight emphasises

the rich interplay of the social, the cognitive and the affective, culture, reason and

sensibility linked to the deliverances of experience in its fine-grained particularity

(1999, p. 138). A proper discussion of this potentially very fruitful idea is beyond the

scope of this article; but it is worth noting that any argument that practice-basedresearch generates phronesis would need to investigate whether this mode of knowledge


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142 A. Pakes

can be accommodated within a framework that still emphasises the traditional require-

ments on research to be original, rigorous and disseminable. [27] And the question of

the appropriate balance between conformity to pre-established standards and originality

would still need to be addressed.

McFees (1994) justification of the role of dance in education also offers suggestionsas to the knowledge embodied in dance works. He aims to show how dance is unique

in order to argue its irreplaceability in the curriculum, and so his strategy is to show

how dance is distinctive, firstly as a form of human action and secondly as an object of

aesthetic and artistic interest. According to McFee, dance is a form of intentional human

action, governed by reason, in which we take aesthetic rather than purposive interest;

that is, we look at dance for its own sake, in terms of its intrinsic aims and values, not

because it is the means to achieving an externally defined goal. Like other art forms,

dance also embodies a reflection on (and hence the possibility of an emotional education

in) what Best (1985, p. 159) and McFee (1994, p. 18) call life issues. Dance explores the

range of possible responses to life situations and allows us to experience the finershades of feeling, [] refining [] those concepts under which those feelings are

experienced, and under which those experiences are characterised (McFee, 1994, p. 40).

This is not an external goal imposed on dance from the outside, but an internal dynamic

characteristic of art as such. Like the other arts, then, dance can refresh the way we

experience the world, renewing perceptions by altering the concepts by which they are

oriented and shaped. Dance is also distinctive as an art form, being both a performing

art and essentially physical. And, McFee argues, each individual dance work offers

something unique in terms of knowledge, because it can neither be paraphrased into

another medium nor interchanged with any other work without losing its particular

impact.

Much of McFees (1994) argument focuses on the centrality of understanding dance

to dance education. What is important, he suggests, is that pupils develop their

understanding of dance, an educational goal which can be achieved via initiation into

dance appreciation, dance criticism and also dance practice. Practical involvement in

dance, according to McFees perspective, is not valuable for its own sake but in terms

of its pedagogical function in enhancing dance understanding:

It is well established that ones appreciation of technique, etc., in all art forms

(including dance) is typically sharpened by the sorts of insights that practicalinvolvement offers. Thus practical involvement in dance might well be justified

on such a conception; however, if it is, it is justified in terms of its contribu-

tions to the understanding of dance (and hence, indirectly, of life), as one

possible method (amongst many). (McFee, 1994, p. 60)

Where does this view locate the value of practice as research? As suggested above,

McFee does not tackle this question explicitly other than to indicate that he does not

consider the creation of dances to be a form of research. But, by extension, his argument

would seem to suggest that the value of original investigation in dance is that it

contributes something new to specifically dance understanding and, indirectly, to ourunderstanding of the life issues dance tackles. The originality of dance practice as


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research on this view would be measured against our existing knowledge about and

understanding of dance.

Is this framework able to accommodate a sense of both the originality and the

distinctiveness of the knowledge that can be developed through dance practice? Yes and

no. It allows us to characterise the epistemological value of practice-based research indance as contributing something new to our understanding of, primarily, dance and,

secondarily, the life issues that the dance work tackles. Thus practitioner-researchers do

not have to choose between developing dance knowledge or answering broader ques-

tions (c.f. the discussion above); both kinds of information are aspects of the intrinsic

structure of the dance. But the emphasis on dance practice as primarily a means to

understand dance seems somewhat solipsistic and inward-lookinga self-perpetuating

endeavour which has no need to look outside of itself or address its broader relevance

to the development of human understanding. The problem of the extent to which a

work would need to be original to qualify for PhD status also remains. McFee argues

for the irreplaceability of each dance work, suggesting that each has a unique cognitivevalue, in other words, that each is original in the knowledge it embodies. How, then,

does one distinguish between levels of originality in order to discriminate between an

undergraduate student piece and a practice-based PhD project in terms of their respect-

ive cognitive value? [28]

Most significantly, though, McFees ideas do not seem to provide the framework for

a convincing argument that practice as such makes a distinctive contribution to dance

understanding. Within McFees discussion, practical involvement is simply one way

amongst others of developing that understanding. But perhaps the emergence of practice

as research itself suggests that a makers knowledge of her creation is of a particular, if

not a privileged kind. In fact, Hintikka (1975) discusses a tradition in Western thought

(which incorporates such diverse writers as Maimonides, Bacon, Hobbes, Vico and

Anscombe) about the distinctiveness of makers knowledge as the cause of what it

understands (p. 89). [29] Arguing that making necessarily involves practical knowledge

how, Hintikka is also concerned to stress that this is inseparable from theoretical

understanding: the underlying idea of this tradition may be said to be the idea that we

can obtain and possess certain especially valuable kinds of theoreticalknowledge only

of what we ourselves have brought about, are bringing about, or can bring about

(p. 84). As in Carrs later work, then there is a recognition of the need to emphasise the

rich interplay of different forms of knowledge within the particularities of artisticexperience. Makers knowledge, as discussed by Hintikka, is also a rich interplay of

practical and theoretical forms of reasoning, held to be ultimately inseparable. [30] Only

by investigating that interplay in its complexity will we begin to assess the scope of the

contribution to knowledge that practice-based research in dance can make.

Towards a Conclusion

The different knowledges that dance practice embodies warrant much more detailed,

epistemological exploration. More sustained critical comparisons with the knowledges

developed in other disciplines would also be necessary in order to interrogate further thecognitive validity of dance practice as research. Cross-discipline comparisons would


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144 A. Pakes

also, no doubt, point up how what is meant by original research has hardly been

interrogated in other domains. Part of the value of practice as research is its challenge

to some of the academys deep-rooted assumptions: it forces a reappraisal of the basis

and viability of expectations previously taken for granted. This has led commentators

such as Candlin (2000), deeply critical of the assumptions underlying reports likeUKCGE (1997a, b), to suggest that instead of trying to make art practice fit academic

regulations it would be more productive to use the practice-based PhD as a way of

re-thinking academic conventions and scholarly requirements (p. 96). Assumptions

about the nature of knowledge are similarly problematised by practice as research in

ways that this article has sought to begin to explore.

There is, however, a certain tension between the desire to recognise the force of this

challenge and the necessity of coming to terms with existing frameworks and the

epistemologies they imply. For all the radical potential of practice as research, PhD

students and supervisors are currently having to negotiate those frameworks and their

assumptions, whether these are justified or not. It is not just within the wider contextsof national bodies such as HEFCE, QAA and the RAE that the battle for practice as

research is fought, but also at the local level of particular institutions and particular

projects. Hockey and Allen-Collinson (2000) cite interviews with a number of supervi-

sors on the problem of steering proposals and upgrading applications through university

research committees. At these levels, a projects claim to originality in knowledge has to

be clearly and adequately justified in terms that the broader university community can

understand and accept. Philosophical, and more specifically epistemological, investiga-

tion may be useful in helping to establish a workable consensus about the value and

limits of practice as research both within and beyond the community of those directly

involved. [31] By working through the problems and drawing on resources from a

variety of philosophical traditions, it can suggest ways to ground the claim to knowl-

edge and particular methodologies of practice as research. A first stage in this process

is to open up the problems, exploring their nature and scope in the way I hope this

article as begun to do.

Philosophy can never hope to offerlet alone seek to imposedefinitive solutions or

rigid criteria for what is acceptable as new knowledge developed through dance. The

claim to originality has to be made on a case-by-case basis, and (as suggested above) in

different ways at different stages of a practice-based project. Ultimately, the researcher,

supervisor and examiners are those who will decide on how to articulate and whetherto uphold a PhDs claim to doctorateness (and arguably a process of practical

reasoning is already embedded in their intelligent performance of these tasks). Philo-

sophical perspectives do, however, offer a range of resources which can contribute to,

as well as reflect on and unpack, this decision-making process. Philosophical discourse

also provides a critical perspective on the conceptual parameters of institutional

discourse, which can furnish a check on the viability and reasonableness of institutional

expectations of research, useful from the point of view of research students, their

supervisors and examiners. Moreover, in a political climate where pragmatic and

instrumental approaches to academic issues are increasingly dominant, philosophical

discussion offers a valuable opportunity to reflect on the principles underwritinghigher-level studyto think seriously about what, as researchers, we are really about.


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NOTES

[1] For the purposes of this discussion, I use the terms practice as research and practice-based

research synonymously to designate creative work presented as research. Kershaw (2001)

distinguishes between the two, although, as Piccini (2002) points out, this distinction is by no

means uncontested. For Kershaws definitions, see note 8.

[2] For a historical overview of the institutional fortunes of practice as research in the performingarts in the last decade, see Piccini (2002). Candlin (2001) outlines the history of practice-based

research in the visual arts and design.

[3] See UKCGE (1997a), (1997b) and (2001). On practice-based doctorates in the visual arts, see

Painter (1996) and Candlin (2001). For further contextual information about the British higher

education system, see Appendix..

[4] It implies an acceptance in principle; in practice, supervisors and students often still encounter

difficulties trying to convince research committees composed of academics from other fields of

the validity and viability of their research proposals. Hockey and Allen-Collinsons (2000)

empirical survey of supervisors includes some typical examples (pp. 347350).

[5] This point is well made by Susan Melrose in Thomson (2003), whose interventions (alongside

those of research students engaged in or having completed practice-based PhDs) are notableexceptions to this trend.

[6] The numbering and order of this list is not intended to indicate the relative importance of these

different meanings. Indeed Bailey (1992) lists them in a different sequence. I have presented the

list in this way in an effort to ensure clarity in the exposition that follows.

[7] The term artworld is adopted from Danto (1964) to signify the complex of art history and

theory which contexts and constitutes works of art as such.

[8] The distinction drawn by Kershaw (2001) between practice-based research and practice as

research is relevant here: I take practice-based research to refer to research through live

performance practice, to determine how and what it maybe contributing in the way of new

knowledge or insights in fields other than performance. Hence, practice-based research may be

pursued for many purposeshistorical, political, aesthetic, etc.and so researchers may notneed to be theatre scholars to pursue it. By practice-as-research I refer to research into

performance practice, to determine how that practice may be developing new insights into or

knowledge about the forms, genres, uses, etc. of performance itself, for example with regard

to their relevance to broader social and/or cultural processes (2001, p. 138).

[9] UKCGE (2001), which reports on the findings of the working group on research training for

practice-based doctorates, notes that there is no clear consensus on how explicitly a piece of

works claim to originality has to be made; the report also recognises that there is still debate

over the extent to which artistic quality itself might be an essential measure in the assessment

of a successful research degree in practice (p. 17). On this issue in relation to music, see also

Samuels in UKCGE (1997b).

[10] On this issue, see Margolis (1981), who argues against Goodman (1976) that dance is anautographic rather than an allographic art form since it depends for its identity and aesthetic

impact on the natural expressiveness of individual human bodies.

[11] UKCGE (2001) describes a problematic case in which a PhD examiner was an expert on the

historical context of the project but had no experience of the contemporary creative context

although this was where much of the rigour and all of the originality of the research lay

(p. 42); this suggests the importance, at least in relation to some projects, of awareness of the

current directions of artistic practice as well as past history.

[12] And, indeed, the AHRBs definition has been used also in the doctoral context: UKCGE (2001)

notes that the AHRB definition provided a focus for much of the 2001 working groups debate

(p. 12).

[13] For further discussion of the PhD in composition and some of the debates about the

appropriateness or otherwise of an accompanying verbal commentary, see Rhian Samuels

paper in UKCGE (1997b). The role of the verbal commentary in arts other than music is


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146 A. Pakes

discussed further below. It would be interesting to explore in more detail the possibility of

adopting in dance a similar practice to the PhD in composition, but this is beyond the scope

of this article.

[14] Melrose (in Thomson, 2003) notes that, partly in response to its consultation exercise with the

performing arts sector, the QAA articulates within its qualifications framework the expectation

that PhD submissions be mixed mode (i.e. include a written thesis): just the doingitselfhasnot been entertained in the sector with regard to higher degree submissions (p. 178). UKCGE

(2001), however, does discuss the written component of practice-based doctorates in a rather

different way and notes that the 2001 working group held a variety of views on the verbal

commentarys role. The report suggests that the written element should be more than a factual

report, that it should define some critical and intellectual perspective and that it should not

merely justify the practice (pp. 1617). Although the need for a verbal document may be less

contentious in the PhD research context, then, there is still debate over these issues.

[15] Many of these issues as they relate to performance practice as research are debated in Thomson

(2003).

[16] Reprinted from his (1958) article Creativity in Art,The Philosophical Review, 67, pp. 115.

[17] In this and in other respects, Tomas account remains very close to the more celebrateddiscussion of art, and the art/craft contrast, in Collingwoods aesthetics: see Collingwood

(1970).

[18] It may also chime with some practice-based PhD supervisors experience, as Melroses

comment about student participants in practice as research discussion groups suggests: Some

participants have indicated that they aspire, not only to new insights but also to rigour and

depth in performing-arts practices. They have suggested that their supervisors themselves

seem to be unable to indicate precisely what might constitute PhD-worthy rigour or depth

(although they claim to be able to recognize it when they see it) (in Thomson, 2003, p. 163).

[19] Poppers claim that it must be possible for an empirical scientific system to be refuted by

experience (p. 41) is (in spite of the two philosophers differences in other respects) similar to

Wittgensteins insight that it is impossible to speak of knowledge where there is no possibilityof being wrong (1958). A related point is made by Anscombe (1963, p. 14): there is point in

speaking of knowledge only where a contrast exists between he knows and he (merely)

thinks he knows .

[20] On these issues, see also UKCGE (2001) which argues for a fundamental contrast between

practice-based arts research and scientific research: it is claimed that in practice as research

hypotheses may emerge only late in the process (whereas they govern scientific work from the

outset) and analysis takes place within iterative cycles of creative work rather than as a

separate post-hoc activity (p. 43) (as in scientific research). The parallels and contrasts between

these different models of research warrant further investigation, unfortunately beyond the

scope of this article. For a discussion of different methodologies which might be appropriate

within practice-based performing arts disciplines, see Trimingham (2002) and Freeman (2002).

[21] Presumably, a candidate whose questions were not original (or likely to lead to the generation

of new knowledge) would not have been accepted as a PhD candidate in the first place, so there

is no need to consider the converse scenario.

[22] McFee (1994) includes a chapter (pp. 181192) on Reflective practice and dance research,

which emphasises the need for a disciplinarily distinctive form of dance research and the

importance of dance education research. McFee is explicit, however, that in his sense dance

research doesnotinvolve the creation of dances; [s]tudents of dance may, for some purposes,

be creators of dances, but that activity should be seen as importantly different from the

activities of dance scholars (p. 182).

[23] Dance may, of course, be the object of a scientific or historical enquiry, and new factsabout

dance discovered. Equally, dance might be studied in terms of what it reveals about the culture

or society in which it is practised. But the basis of these forms of empirical or anthropological

research is quite distinct from the idea that dance practice itself generates knowledge.


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[24] This distinction is evoked but not developed in Franc Chamberlains interventions in the

discussion in Thomson (2003); see pp. 171178. See also Zarrilli (2001).

[25] The distinction between practical and theoretical reasoning is explored in Aristotles

Nichomachean Ethics (Aristotle, 2000), especially Book VI. See also Anscombe (1963) and

Kenny (1966).

[26] See Aristotle (2000), especially Book VI, for a discussion of the distinctions between these formsof knowledge.

[27] My presentation at the National Practice as Research Conference, organised by PARIP, in

Bristol, September 2003 will examine these questions in more detail.

[28] According to McFees argument, each work has unique cognitive value provided it is anart

work. According to the kind of pragmatic institutionalism adopted by McFees (1992) text, a

dance work is art if it has been accepted as such by the broader danceworld context (or

Republic of dance). One might argue that an undergraduate students work is not art under

this rubric, although this argument would then seem to be in tension with the idea of the

artistic account of dance as the basis for dance education.

[29] This idea is taken from Anscombe (1963, p. 87), who is in turn citing Aquinass Summa

Theologica.

[30] Candlin (2001) highlights the long history of [visual] artists engaging with intellectual issues,

concepts and philosophies and of making work which is thoroughly engaged at critical level

(p. 100). Indeed, her article relates the emergence of the practice-based PhD in art and design

to the theoretical revolution in art practice in the wake of the evolution of feminism,

postcolonialism, poststructuralism and postmodernism. Much dance practice seems much less

explicitly theoretically informed, however, although it would be interesting to trace a similarly

detailed archaeology of the practice-based PhD in dance.

[31] Susan Melrose (in Thomson, 2003) suggests that the absence of such a consensus in the PhD

context is a problem that the debate about practice as research has not sufficiently recognised:

It is not simply a matter of practice problematizing practice, but of whether or not there is

some kind of national agreement as to the quality of the enquiry and of the outcomes

submitted for examination. PhD examinations may well always involve a degree of compro-mise between institutions but, at least where a wholly written dissertation is at issue, many

institutions have undertaken to make the bases for judgement transparent and all participants

accountable in terms that are widely accepted. It is not clear that a similar claim can be made

for the criteria for assessment of practices which constitute a component of a mixed-mode

dissertation (pp. 164165).

REFERENCES

ALCOFF, L. M. (Ed.) (1988) Epistemology: the big questions (Oxford, Blackwell).

ALISON, B. (1994) Research in art and design in the United Kingdom,Higher Education Review, 26,pp. 4964.

ANSCOMBE, G. E. M. (1963) Intention (2nd edn) (Oxford, Basil Blackwell).

ARISTOTLE (2000) Nichomachean Ethics, translated & edited by R. CRISP (Cambridge, Cambridge

University Press).

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APPENDIX

The higher education system in England and Wales within the Arts and Humanities isbuilt around three levels of academic qualifications: at undergraduate level, the Bachelor

of Arts (Honours) degree generally takes three years to complete, with awards at

Certificate (after one years study) and Diploma (after two years study) also available;

at postgraduate level, Masters degrees (Master of Arts or taught Master of Philosophy)

generally take one years full-time or two to three years part-time study to complete,

and usually require submission of an independent project or Dissertation towards the

end of the course; at postgraduate research level, students can spend two to seven years

working towards a Master of Philosophy (MPhil by research) or Doctor of Philosophy

(PhD or DPhil) qualification. Professional doctoral qualifications, which often include

an element of practice as well as a taught component, are also available in some

disciplines and institutions. PhDs, meanwhile, are independent research projects, usually

resulting in a written thesis of 70,000 to 100,000 words. Normally, a new research

student registers for an MPhil degree on the basis of a research proposal; s/he can then

upgrade to PhD after one or two years by submitting a developed proposal and sample

work, and passing a viva voce examination.

The English higher education system is partly funded by the Higher Education

Funding Council of England (HEFCE) a quasi-autonomous body which receives its

grant from the government. The Quality Assurance Agency or QAA (which is linked to

HEFCE) is responsible for ensuring that teaching standards and the integrity of thequalifications framework are maintained. HEFCE funding for research by staff within

university departments is linked to the Research Assessment Exercise (RAE) which takes

place every five to seven years and is designed to assess the quality of research produced

by individual institutions. Only published work rather than work towards a research

qualification is counted in the RAE.


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