What Movement Analysts Do

Laban Movement Analysis (LMA) is the identifying language for movement description in disciplines that explore the domain of human movement behavior, in both function and expression.

Certification in Movement Analysis programs provide in-depth study and practice in utilizing LMA/BF as a framework for enhancing movement experience, movement vocabulary and communication. Movement Analysts utilize their skills and knowledge in a variety of fields, including dance training and research, somatic practice, bodywork and physical therapy, theater arts and performance, all forms of movement education, research, choreography, fitness, corporate coaching, dance therapy and other clinical practices.

Program participant Julie Weltzien devised an approach to embodied learning for her students in Landscape Design Education and Kinesthetic Awareness – American University, Beirut, Lebanon. (Photographs by George Salameh)

Training in LMA/BF draws upon experiential, theoretical, and practical learning, with faculty collaborating in student development as facilitators, advisers, and professional role models as Movement Analysts and Somatic Movement Therapists and Educators. Since 1966, when the first graduates of the Laban Certificate Program in New York began to apply Laban and Bartenieff theories to their work, the Certificate in Movement Analysis has become a respected indication of rigorous training and well-developed insight into human movement. As such, it is recognized as a valuable professional credential in many disciplines.

Many Certified Movement Analysts chair or teach in departments at major colleges and universities in Canada, England, the United States, and other countries.

LMA/BF continues to shape new applications in any field where a deep understanding of the functional and expressive aspects of movement are important. The following are selections from a few varied examples of the ways in which participants have used LMA/BF and Somatic training in application:

in dance training and research, in Secondary and Higher Education;
in published research in Somatics and nonverbal behavior;
as Yoga and Pilates teachers, for deepening knowledge of movement patterning fundamentals, and developing somatic approaches to teaching and touching;
as fitness specialists developing safe and efficient, three-dimensional fitness classes for all ages;
as physical and occupational therapists integrating LMA/BF in movement re-education;
in Theater directing, and actor-training;
as choreographic tools using LMA/BF to distill and organize movement quality;
in dance movement therapy/psychotherapy, clinical evaluation, research and practice;
in bodywork practice, for assessment and movement re-education;
in holistic clinical treatment, combining cranial sacral therapy with LMA/BF in pediatric and adult care; and combining psychotherapy with hands-on bodywork practice;
in dance movement therapy, utilizing Movement Analysis and Somatic Practice to deepen relationship through movement, and provide tools for assessment and treatment results;
in anthropology and nonverbal communication, utilizing LMA as a codified system of describing movement behavior;
in various traditional folk dances, utilizing LMA/BF for research, and for improving technique training and performance;
in design of architectural movement space;
in corporate coaching;
for improving nonverbal components in public speaking.