Dynamic Alignment Through Imagery (Paperback)

by Eric N. Franklin (Author) "Approximately 35,000 years ago, there appears to have been a sudden expansion in the creation of body ornamentation and the use of visual imagery..." (more)
Key Phrases: sitz bones, imagine the pelvis, constructive rest position, Andre Bernard, New York, Mabel Todd (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Review
"
"""The use of imagery to improve human alignment and movement has been practiced by relatively few adherents, most of them professionals. Now, with Eric Franklin's book Dynamic Alignment Through Imagery, the technique of using imagery is made clear for the general public as well for professionals. Franklin is to be commended for bringing this important work to a wider audience."""
Andre Bernard
Adjunct Assistant Professor Dance Education
New York University
"""This is a charming and humorous synthesis of ideas contained in the writings of Mabel Todd, Lulu Sweigard, Barbara Clark, and their students."""
Irene Dowd
Faculty, The Juilliard School
Guest Faculty, The National Ballet School of Canada
"""The main purpose of body alignment in dance is to create efficient control of movement. Eric Franklin's book Dynamic Alignment Through Imagery equips readers with the basic knowledge and exercises to achieve a clear and useful alignment."""
Zvi Gotheiner
Choreographer and Teacher, New York City
"

Product Description
Destined to become a classic text and reference, Dynamic Alignment Through Imagery shows you how to use imaging techniques to improve posture and alignment and release excess tension. The book`s 195 illustrations will help you visualize the images and exercises and show you how to use them in a variety of contexts.

Part I of Dynamic Alignment Through Imagery discusses the origins and uses of imagery and includes 36 exercises that demonstrate dynamic alignment in practice. You`ll explore the importance of posture and dynamic alignment and discover how to use imagery to affect body movement.

Part II explains the biomechanical and anatomical principles behind complex imagery and illustrates 52 exercises to bring these principles to life. You`ll learn how to use basic physics to create a strong yet fluid balance in your muscles and joints.

Part III provides 250 anatomical imagery exercises to help you fine-tune alignments and increase body awareness. The exercises focus on different regions of the body--the pelvis, hips, knees, lower legs, spine, shoulders, arms, hands, head, and neck--as well as on breathing. You can select specific images to address individual needs or follow the sequence presented in the book.

And Part IV provides 23 holistic exercises to sculpt and improve alignment in various positions--standing, supine, and sitting. These exercises will help you establish a body image that facilitates dynamic alignment and releases excess tension.

By practicing the techniques described in Dynamic Alignment Through Imagery, you`ll tap into the power of imagery and create better movement.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 320 pages
• Publisher: Human Kinetics Publishers (January 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0873224752
• ISBN-13: 978-0873224758
• Product Dimensions: 10.9 x 8.4 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #16,561 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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  #1 in	Books > Arts & Photography > Performing Arts > Dance
  #14 in	Books > Science > Medicine > Specialties > Physical Medicine & Rehabilitation
  #18 in	Books > Science > Medicine > Specialties > Sports Medicine

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

47 of 50 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Live with gravity not against it., July 18, 2005

By	Steven Larsen (Philadelphia, USA) - See all my reviews

I am a big fan of Eric Franklin's books. As a dance instructor, not a fitness instructor, he is well aware of the finer points of human performance that are often overlooked by a society so focused on speed and strength. I would recommend this book for two groups of people. One is those studying anatomy. By going through the exercises, the major muscles and bones of the body can be learned on deeper and more useful level than simply by studying them in a book. Experiential learning is best in this case. Second, those with a strong ability to visualize, which doesn't include everyone. Alignment through visualization can be adifficult skill to learn. Having taught in a field similar to Franklin's, I know that not everyone has the internal sense to grasp the concepts here.

A thorough, insightful and well-illustrated(!) book.

76 of 87 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars How to Deal With Gravity, August 17, 2000

A Kid's Review

Gravity is the most influencial force in our lives. Eric Franklin's Dynamic Alignment Through Imagery deals how to move in the gravity field.

I am not a professial dancer. But I am approaching walking the 4.0 minute mile using body images in Franklin's book as a guide for good alignment. This imagery that moves your body parts better keeps your interest. It is fun. Right now I am working on hip motions images.

How much do I like it? I bought five copies to give to my children so they could share good alignment with my grandchildren. So, they all will know how to deal with and make peace with gravity.

22 of 25 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Forget the Aspirin, Take a Franklin Instead and Call Me in the Morning, December 27, 2006

By	Alouette1 "alouette1" (USA) - See all my reviews

The body is an amazing thing. We look at architecture and don't see a simularity in it with us, yet just as beams and walls and cielings support buildings, bones, ligaments and skin support what we inhabit and live in. Just as a building's foundation and subsequent floors affect how it stands and reacts in an earthquake or wind storm, how we walk, position our pelvises, carry our shoulders and necks and arms affects how we react to our environment and as this book emphasizes-- gravity.

DATI brings together everything wonderful about our bodies. Gravity isn't good or bad, it just is and we need to learn to deal with it. DATI is one of the best books on getting to know your muscles. If you don't know why they or even if they do and where they are, you can't work with them. Franklins visualization is second to none as far as helping the reader gain feeling through imagining water or air finning up an area and then letting it all out. He takes what we can relate to, describes it in another area, and moves us through to places that we didn't have names for.

Franklin has a sense of humor. (Humor is imporatant because it establishes a sence of the irony in looking at life.) He tells the reader of a commedian who went to basic training. After a week, his stomach started to feel funny. He went to many doctors, convinced that something was dreadfully wrong only to discover that for the first time in his life that he was not suffering from heartburn! This is important because in changing our bodies, when we change soemthing that is bad, it might not feel right.

I highly reccommend this book especially for GYN patients. Doctors who aren't trained in body movement will not understand how to guide their patients into understanding. I've had nine children and was getting revolted by what I felt like I had no control over. Since I am a yoga practicer, I decided to see what I could do before an operation and this is turning out to be a great investment. I think the best thing is that I have gotten control over muscles that are attached to bones that are attached to connective tissue that work with inner organs that were once loose. I am not afraid to sneeze any more or of watching nurses react with paste faces to what I tell them. This book has helped me get more acquainted with my body so I am able to discuss it. It's very hard to go in to a doctor's office, see a nurse that you've never seen before and start discussing problems that you never thought you'd have to deal with. When you know your body, you can speak with confidence about it. (In my case, the problem is in the process of being fixed.)

I highly suggest that OB/Gyns/urologists and family practitioners at least read this book. Without an understanding of how the body's muscles are used, doctors don't help us unless they are cutting in to us. I almost had an operation based on one doctor's response to my sagging organs with, "OK, I can operate on that." The man is nothing but a body mechanic-- he doesn't understand how our bodies work-- just that when they don't that he can fix them through an operation, and isn't aware of what a patient can do to help her-or-himself, yet he is one of the alleged finest in our state. He's really not that great-- he's like a musician that can only play one style of music with one instrument. If he was ever inspired, he's lost it. I am not slamming him; this is the case with many, many doctors. (This is the case with anyone who has done the same thing for too long and not realized that how little they know.)

I urge patients to learn from books like this and learn to ask questions and help yourselves. Doctors are slaves of convention and the latest word from the AMA. I am not against operations to fix what doesn't work, but the ramifications of an operation can be bad-- for what my doctor was proposing, I would have never been able to do certain stretches and bends in yoga. Give your self six weeks to try Franklin's approach and fix your problem and if it doesn't work, get operated on. I will warn anyone doing this that if you don't have a background in body movement, ie; yoga, dance, some type of athletics, it will take longer to get results. Our body awareness starts on the outside and works inward, and you will have a new vocabulary to get familiar with.

Imagery is hard. You have to know how to focus. I highly suggest that you try yoga. I learned to empty my mind in a Hatha Yoga class and learned to chant because it kept my mind on my body position and my breath. I am a highly amped person and need this-- others may be able to do it more easilly. If you have never worked out before, I think that you will get better results from this book if you take at least a short class in something so that you can get used to how your body works. You may also benefit from Uta Hagen's Respect for Acting where she teaches acting using the entire body. Acting isn't about --I strike a dramatic pose here-- it's about how one REacts to the environment and this creates what you are phsyically.