Date of Award
Spring 5-18-2024
Document Type
Thesis
Degree Name
MA - Master of Arts
Department
Expressive Therapies
Advisor
Meg Chang
Abstract
Research is starting to focus on the effects of climate change on mental health, especially future-oriented anxieties and uncertainty about our planet’s liveability. Less commonly discussed are feelings of grief for the climate-related losses we have already sustained. This thesis organizes current literature about climate grief and data about the psychosomatic effects of climate-related losses and examines general grief counseling research, as well as presenting applications of dance movement therapy for grief and loss. Cultural and historical gestures and movements of grieving bodies and portrayals of grief in dance history support the proposal that dance movement therapists are capable of offering potent interventions for working with climate grief. This work suggests that acknowledging, embodying and sharing our climate grief through movement, ritual and other expressive arts highlights our collective creativity, sustains our hope and creates opportunities for healing and change.
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
Recommended Citation
Lovin, Elisabeth, "Climate Grief and Dance Movement Therapy: A Literature Review" (2024). Expressive Therapies Capstone Theses. 850.
https://digitalcommons.lesley.edu/expressive_theses/850
Rights
The author owns the copyright to this work.
