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Oct 13, 2025
Whitney Laemmli on Making Movement Modern
Summary
Peoples & Things host, Lee Vinsel, talks with Whitney Laemmli, Assistant Professor in the Department of Social Science and Cultural Studies at the Pratt Institute, about her forthcoming book, Making Movement Modern: Science, Politics, and the Body in Motion. The book traces a technique for visualizing human movement, Labanotation, from its origins in expressionist dance, Austro-Hungarian military discipline, and contemporary physiology to its employment in factories and offices a half-century later. In this way, Making Movement Modern provides a beautiful example of following an object of study into many different, surprising, and unexpected worlds. The pair also discuss one of Laemmli’s new projects, which examines the history of Western ideas and theories that memory might be stored not only in brains but also in bodies.
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Your Host
Lee Vinsel
Lee Vinsel is an associate professor in the Department of Science, Technology and Society at Virginia Tech. He studies human life with technology, with particular focus on the relationship between government, business, and technological change. His first book, Moving Violations: Automobiles, Experts, and Regulations in the United States, was published by Johns Hopkins University Press in July 2019.
