Fellows Feature: Karen Huang on Gaga and collective action
The Fellows program is an opportunity to bring together Georgetown faculty from across the University—as well as visiting scholars—for community building, curricular development, and pedagogical experimentation. At these gatherings (also known as “salons” or “jam sessions”), the expanded Ethics Lab team comes together to share ideas and research, discuss best practices, and identify areas where their work overlaps through engaging and playful facilitation.
Karen Huang is an Assistant Professor at the McCourt School of Public Policy at Georgetown University, and a Faculty Associate at the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University. Her research in science and technology studies (STS) examines the making of moral reasoning and citizenship. She holds a Ph.D. and M.A. from Harvard University, and a B.A. from Yale University.
In this interview, Huang discusses her Fellows salon on Gaga and collective action, as well as related work.
Karen Huang
Assistant Professor, McCourt School of Public Policy
What drew you to Ethics Lab?
I think that Ethics Lab is a really unique space on campus for developing creative pedagogy and experimenting with ideas, especially by bringing together scholars and designers from different backgrounds. I also very much align with Ethics Lab’s overall orientation toward collective thought and action.
How did you come up with the idea to explore improvisational practices for your jam session?
Since Ethics Lab is a space to explore creative practice and scholarship, I thought it would be a unique opportunity to bring in knowledge from my dance practice. I wanted to explore how these insights could be in conversation with my scholarship in science and technology studies (STS).
Gaga, which was developed by the choreographer Ohad Naharin, is a movement language I’ve been learning over the years. In Gaga, dancers are guided through a series of prompts, which are layered to expand a dancer’s palette of available options for movement. During the salon, I facilitated the exploration of two questions I’ve been thinking about lately. First, how could improvisational practices inform a politics of unpredictability? Second, how might practices from Gaga, such as groove, peripheral sensing, and imagination, facilitate the opening of alternative possibilities?
What role does unpredictability play in Gaga and creative work?
In Gaga, there are so many elements of surprise. As an audience member, you’ll see that a dance might be going in a certain direction, and then a movement could suddenly catch you off guard. As a Gaga dancer, at any moment, you are available to find changes in textures, shapes, or rhythms. During the salon, I invited us to illustrate predictability and unpredictability in different contexts of creative practice and scholarship. For example, in one group we explored how approaching the edge between predictability and unpredictability could be really generative. In another group, we talked about how “structured improvisation” – or predictable unpredictability – could provide parameters for legibility while allowing for spontaneity to emerge.
What are some connections between the Gaga movement language and collective action?
My dance practice has inspired some questions around the relation between critical approaches and creative approaches. Specifically, I’ve been thinking about how the questioning of taken-for-granted forms could open space for exploring alternative possibilities. During the salon, I invited us to explore how practices such as groove and peripheral sensing – interpreted politically – might facilitate collective action.
Connecting to groove means connecting to the joy and pleasure of dancing. Once you find your groove, then you send your groove into the physical room of the space and beyond. We talked about how groove could provide a structure, beyond explicit communication, for responding to one another.
What I call peripheral sensing refers to the practice of moving together, by feeling how your senses extend to the edges of the collective. We discussed how, in a political context, drawing attention to peripheral spaces could help us to rethink activity at the margins, and to rethink the relation between widening the center and creating new, multiple “centers.”
What comes next for this work?
I want to keep thinking about how knowledge from creative practices could contribute to social and political knowledge. In particular, I’m excited to explore how creative practices could inform constructive approaches that follow from a space of critique.
What’s inspiring you right now?
I’ve been thinking quite a bit about the critical role that social movements play in public policy. I’m interested in how to facilitate collective action among policymakers, activists, and academics to create meaningful policy change. This is a topic that I explore extensively in my ethics courses at the McCourt School, and I’ve been inspired by how my students are developing those collective pathways for social change.