Joint Improvisation Meeting 2015

“The Science of Joint Improvisation”

The first “Joint Improvisation Meeting” (JIM)

4-6 of November 2015

Paris, France

Organizers:

Asaf Bachrach (UMR 7023 CNRS/ Paris 8)

Ivan Magrin-chagnolleau (ACTE,CNRS/Paris 1)

Lior Noy (Weizmann Institute, IL)

Joint Improvisation Meeting 2015 from CNRS Site POUCHET on Vimeo.

general aims:

We understand joint improvisation as an artistic form involving two or more performers engaging in multiple real-time interactions: with each other, with the audience and with the emerging content. Improvisers freely explore, within some boundaries, a large space of possibilities for new joint discoveries.

While joint improvisation has long standing history in dance, music and theatre, its scholarship as a unified phenomenon, in particular from a scientific perspective, is still in its infancy. Moreover, the perspective of joint improvisation is useful in studying a range of human phenomena beyond the boundaries of the artistic arena, including conversation, scientific co-discovery and the dynamics of groups operating in emergency situations.

The “Science of Joint Improvisation” meeting aims to bring together researchers from a number of different fields to establish a rigorous study of joint improvisation. First, the conference will bring together researchers that currently apply a scientific approach to study joint improvisation, using different paradigms – verbal report analysis, kinematic measurements, brain imaging and mathematical modeling. Second, the conference is open to researchers from different subfields of cognitive and behavioral sciences, social sciences and philosophy that study topics highly related to group improvisation, such as group creativity, aesthetic perception, linguistics, kinesthetic empathy and the human ‘mirror system’. We also see joint improvisation as a specific case of joint action, and look forward to contributions of experts from this growing field. Contributions from practitioners of improvisation will also be welcome.

The aim of this meeting is to foster scientific investigation of joint improvisation as a unique phenomenon, and as a rich novel ground for an ecological study of a number of central questions regarding human nature. The workshop is supported by the DIM cerveau & pensée (Ile de France).

full program:

JointImprovisationMeetingJIM2015

Videos from the event:

Christian Keysers

“Brain to Brain approaches to joint actions”

Patrick Healey

“Improvising Interaction”

Saul Albert

“Extemporary movement: an interactional account of partner dance improvisation”

Tommi Himberg

“Mirroring improvised hand movements in a dyad”

Ashley Walton

“Musical Improvisation: Spatiotemporal patterns of coordination”

“Quantifying JI” roundtable

Ivan Magrin Chagnolleau

“Joint Improvisation in Music and Dance: Some Preliminary Phenomenological Considerations on Improvisation as an Enactive Process”

Uri Alon

“Going into the unknown in science and art”

Valeria Gazzola

“From me and you to we: how our brain integrates our actions and emotions when we interact”

Guillaume Dumas

“Operationalizing Social Neuroscience through HumanHuman and HumanMachine Interactions”

Michael Schober

“How much do jazz improvisers share understanding with each other and with their listeners?”

Neta Spiro
“Joint improvisation in music therapy: characterising interaction in individual sessions with children with autism spectrum disorders”

Julien Laroche

“Being together when time is improvised: interactive coordination in pedagogical improvisations”

RachelShlmoit Brezis

“Testing the limits – and potential of joint improvisation: Motor skills, social skills and interpersonal synchronization in adults with autism spectrum disorders”