Marion's Somatic Certification

Help me on my journey to become certified as a Dynamic Embodiment Practitioner and a Registered Somatic Movement Therapist. 

 I am passionate about the poetry of our living body. I love to experience and learn about the processes and chains of connections that dance within us whether we are still or moving.  As an international movement artist for 23 years, I am interested in the intersections between art making, therapy and healing, education and the ways I can contribute to the growth of our social evolution. 

In order to expand my knowledge, fine tune my work and formalize my somatic education studies I need some financial support. These funds will support parts of:

- 5 trips to NY for certification training intensives 
- the purchase of books and materials
- tuition 
- childcare for practice time

Throughout the years I have had the opportunity to study with inspiring somatic teachers: Joanie Carlisle, Christine Cole, KJ Holmes, Janet Kalo, Mark Taylor, Noemi Segarra, Merian Soto, Elaine Summers, Mark Taylor among others, which have supported me in developing tools to expand my expressive potential as a performer and my capacity to make bridges between my physical, spiritual, psychological process and the world around me as an artist, teacher and mother.

This two year certification program under the guidance of Dr. Martha Eddy will give me an opportunity to DEEPEN MY UNDERSTANDING of somatic education and learn about Eddy’s unique blend of Laban/Bartenieff studies with Body-Mind Centering® in order to support individuals and groups achieve their physical potential in the present and overtime. These studies also include a social-emotional lens, and an activist approach which I highly value in my work. It will also help me ZOOM IN and FURTHER DEVELOP the research and work I am currently doing with children, dance students, movement improvisation practitioners and families.  Additionally this certification will help me open new windows for FORWARDING MY CAREER as a choreographer, performer, educator, and certified somatic therapist. 

Alongside my performance career, during the last few years I have focused my attention on developing a pedagogy and the therapeutic aspect of movement intervention as I guide individuals and groups to become more aware of their body sensations, the ways they approach touch, and express themselves through their actions, as well as creating safe spaces where personal and artistic growth can happen. 

Some of the work that I have been excited to do and will continue growing with the tools and knowledge from these studies include: 

— Support children with neurological challenges and sensory needs. I have participated in trainings that focus on developmental movement (Neurological Reorganization) as well as done BMC work with Christine Cole and other individual research on various somatic based methods for understanding how to support my own son at home. I have continued experimenting with engaging in movement interventions using these and other methods such as matching, movement analysis, sensory input, body work, mindfulness, in the spirit of play as a way into children’s world to experience with them empathy, connection and the possibility of change.



—Develop my contact improvisation teaching practice, with the local contact community, at universities and teaching residencies and more specifically during various trips home to Puerto Rico. I collaborated with my sister Noemi Segarra/ PISO proyecto and Danza Contact Puerto Rico, as they hosted my workshop Espacios Magéticos/ Magnetic Spaces alongside other improvisation jams. It was particularly special to teach and collaborate with Noemí and her students during the university’s student lead strike. We explored how the Contact Improvisation principles may be of service for their need to gain more skills for peaceful conflict resolutions while putting their bodies forward as vehicles of resistance. 

—Work with families, specifically the work I have done with a group of fathers and their children through weekly movement session over a year and the creation of  ‘I see you’ which was performed at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. I joined the Fathering Circle  as a choreographer and movement facilitator, and collaborated with Billy Yallowitz in this special community arts project. I learned a lot about the work these fathers do through dialogue to cultivate their vulnerability to each other and their family as nurturers. During this process I was so inspired by finding ways to help fathers and children become present in their physical interactions, inspire trust in each other’s touch and practice ways of listening to each other’s movement, seeing themselves in the other, challenging themselves to expand their range in  expression in a society that reinforces male dominance and aggression.  


Throughout the years I have had the wonderful opportunity to study with inspiring somatic teachers: Joanie Carlisle, Christine Cole, KJ Holmes, Janet Kalo, Mark Taylor, Noemí Segarra, Merián Soto, Elaine Summers, Mark Taylor among others, which have supported me in developing tools to expand my expressive potential as a performer and my capacity to make bridges between my physical, spiritual, psychological process and the world around me as an artist, teacher and mother. 

Your support will make possible for me continue this journey and inspire many others on the way. 

< THANK YOU FOR CONSIDERING MAKING A CONTRIBUTION >

Marion Ramírez - -----was born and raised in San Juan, Puerto Rico were she  studied and performed dance and theater from an early age with wonderful faculty under the direction of Nana Hudo. She did a one year Theater Studies at University of Puerto Rico, completed a BFA in Dance Studies at The Laban Center in London, UK as well received a fellowship to do an MFA in Dance Studies at Temple University in Philadelphia.  She has extensive performance and teaching residencies experience while doing tours in Europe, Korea, US and Puerto Rico and Cuba. She lives in Philadelphia with my family.