I'm going to give three definitions here, one from the East coast school's brochure, one from the West Coast school's brochure and one from me.

Authentic Movement is a profoundly simple form in which a mover moves with eyes closed in the presence of A witness. Movement may begin as an impulse. sensation , gesture, image or memory and develops following the inherent wisdom of the body.Thus, the mover begins to open to unknown aspects of the self and to experience his/her personal. spiritual and creative truth as it manifests and becomes concsious through movement The witness is present to simply "see" the mover without judgement attending fully to both the mover and his/her own inner experience. The meeting of mover and witness in a space of authenticity and integrity provides both the potential for healing and a return to one's true self.

The Authentic Movement Institute offers an innovative curriculum, experiential and theoretical, exploring the inter-weaving of the creative, psychological and sacred through the unique body-based process of Authentic Movement. In this work, one develops kinesthetic awareness, gaining access and giving creative expression to the inner life through an approach in which movement is the personality made visible"

Originally called Movement-In-Depth by its founder, Mary Starks Whitehouse, the method grew from her roots in dance, Jungian studies, and pioneering work in dance/movement therapy. Building on Jung's method of active imagination, she saw symbolic meaning in physical action.

Today the Authentic Movement Institute continues to develop new training approaches to psychotherapy, artistic endeavor, and the enhancement of daily life.

WHAT IS AUTHENTIC MOVEMENT?

Authentic Movement is a completely self-directed form in which individuals may discover a movement pathway that offers a bridge between the conscious and the unconscious. Authentic Movement explores the relationship between a mover and a witness, being seen and seeing. With eyes closed, the mover listens inwardly and finds a movement arising from a hidden prompting a cellular impulse. Gradually the invisible becomes visible, the inaudible becomes audible, and explicit form is given to the content of direct experience. The witness brings a receptive quality of clear attention to the mover. The witness is mindful of the inner world of sensation and meaning, judgment and criticism. Though personal shadow issues may emerge, the witness accepts the mover without analysis or direction and speaks only when the mover asks for a response.The mover and witness together can achieve a level of perception of self and other that evokes deep respect and empathy.

(This was created in response to an e-mail query. What is Authentic Movement?):

What I'm about to say is my own take on it, not specifically the 'party line' of its founders and practioneers, so here goes.

I'm assumming you've been to psychotherapy or a 12 step group at some point in your life (or at least are familiar with what occurs within these contexts)

A patient speaks and a psychotherapist(or others in a 12 step group) listens 'intently' to what the person says. They do this in a way that creates a 'non ordinary reality', where the therapist is there to really and deeply hear what you have to say. This communications is different from that of 'ordinary reality' with friends or family (if you've done there things you know the difference, here you feel really and deeply heard). You are allowed to express the 'deepest parts of yourself in a VERBAL fashion.

But, as you're a dancer you've probably found (as I have) that the deepest most incrediable and wonderful ways to communicate with another human being are not through your words, they're through your dance (and if you improvisationally 'contact' dance with another person what you are able to express through your touch.)

Now with that backround a bit more on AM. Here one person is a mover and one person is a witness. The mover express their feelings through their motion(there is by the way no music played in AM). The feelings they express are not filtered by language (lanuuage is a symbolic representation of feelings, when you speak something ("I am angry", "I love you", "I feel like a nut") you only get a small portion of the 'energies' of the feeling you just spoke because only a very small part of your body/being actually is activated to make these sounds (and these sounds are also culturally encrusted filters, they may allow you to succuently express the feeling but they have a far less energy content then what your body actually feels you want to express.) Movement and words are kinda like quantum physics, you can either accurately measure the motion or mass of a particle but not both. Words very accurately communicate information, but are only a representation of emotions. Movement expresses emotion at a far deeper level, but the accuracy of the observer correctly interperting the message given is far less then if words were used.

So what happens in AM is that the mover through expressing him/her self with their WHOLE BODY (not just their teensy ennsy voice box) is able to express feelings at a FAR DEEPER level then if they spoke these feelings( love, hate, anger, sensuality, my feelings towards my mother, to the boss, the overwhelming pain I feel today, the incredible joy I felt last week ) to the witness. And to express onself and perhaps even be really heard at this deep a level by another human being can be an incredibly moving experience (no pun intended).

Above is what I feel goes on at a deep level, now onto the mechanics:

AM is actually a type of dance therapy, in a private AM session the witness is a trained AM therapist. In a AM group the witness is usually another group member.

What happens in a group (I've never done a private session). Is that one person moves (with eyes closed) and their partner witnesses. Then the witness becomes the mover and the mover the witness and the former witness tries to express in movement what the mover had just expressed. Then after this they discuss what each has seen without trying to interpert it (If I got this straight it's to say things like I saw you jump up and down, or you moved in circles, rather then to say I saw your anger, or 'you looked like jesus on the cross, I personally keep screwing up and interperting, I'm perhaps missing something here). Also usually you are given crayons/paper to draw what you just danced (or write it, if you feel like doing so instead)

There may also be multiple witnesses and multiple movers (or multiple movers and one witness, the leader/therapist). Where multiples occur, at times the movers may make contact with each other, sometimes contact is made for an instant, and people then go their seperate ways (like bumping into another person and saying excuse me). For me where the really interesting contact is made is when the movers feel comfortable enough to keep the contact going.

(Onre of my AM teachers had a comment on my definition just that there are many variations of AM and the ones I mention above are only a small part of the variations possible).

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Still one more definition:by Dr. Iraj Afshar  http://www.indranet.com/renaissance/movement.html