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Feldenkrais Research Journal • volume 2 (2005)

Editorial

Introduction:
Choosing the Path of Least Resistance

Carolin Theuring
MA; Editor in Chief

Keywords
Feldenkrais Method, research

Copyright ©: The copyright for this paper remains with the author(s).

Please cite: (First published in the) Feldenkrais Research Journal, volume 2; 2005.

Service marks: The terms Feldenkrais®, Feldenkrais Method®, Awareness Through Movement®, ATM®,
Functional Integration®, and FI® are service marked terms of the International Feldenkrais® Federation
(IFF) and Feldenkrais professional guilds and associations in many countries. In keeping with academic
conventions, they will not be service marked in the entire text as may be required in nonacademic use,
but only for the first and most prominent use of the terms. In recognition that these phrases are formal
terms referring to specific practices within the Method, and to the Method as a whole, capitalization of all
the words in each term has been retained.

Published by the International Feldenkrais® Federation (IFF) https://feldenkrais-method.org
Available online at https://feldenkraisresearchjournal.org

https://feldenkrais-method.org/
https://feldenkraisresearchjournal.org


Editorial

Introduction:
Choosing the Path of Least Resistance

Carolin Theuring
MA; Editor in Chief

Dear reader,

“Choosing the path of least resistance”. Does this sound like a familiar strategy to you?

Well, I decided to choose the path of least resistance as the motto for this new volume. That is
of course not very ambitious. That is not very scientific either, I know very well, but it was an
option that made it possible to do this work with a low budget and little manpower, in reasonable
time.

This project was put into physical existence one year ago and it is still at its very beginning. For
a second or so, I fancied about a ‘real’ research journal, with peer review and a research
network and…, but after this second my pragmatism quickly took over, I decided to start small,
use these first volumes for experimenting with possibilities and not try to forcefully drag a
high-end-goal out of nothing. And anyways, what would I have done with an editorial board but
nothing to feed them? So the first realistic goal was to get material anyhow.

One way to receive material is that people submit articles. After Vol 1 was published, I received
five submissions over the time of a few months – coming to my big pleasure from all over the
world. Four of them are included here. Jim Stephens (USA), Rose Eisenberg (Mexico), Odette
Guimond (Quebec/CAN) and Robert Webb (AUS), are included, one more from Argentina I
unfortunately couldn’t include (but still: thank you!), because it was, not related enough to
scientific exploration – well that is one serious criterion after all.

Then, cruising through the research lists of Ryan Nagy
((http://www.psych.utah.edu/feldenkrais/research.html) and Werner Kraus
(http://feldenkrais-method.org/en/node/860) I had a second idea: Aren’t there a lot of thesises
and dissertations about the Feldenkrais work lingering out there, waiting to be read, but hard to
find?

After sending a lot of emails to every country with a Feldenkrais guild office, I ended up with four
more pieces (let’s not get into the issue of dragging answers out of the world wide web here…),
patiently waiting for publication: Grit Gürlich & Volker Neubeck (Germany), Warwick Long (New

Introduction • Feldenkrais Research Journal, volume 2 (2005) 2



Zealand), Staffan Elgelid (USA/Sweden) and Larry Goldfarb (USA) spent their scientific
„masterpieces“ on diverse aspects of the Feldenkrais Method and were happy to provide it for
publication online here.

My secret wish was to find more material in different languages. One in Spanish, one in
Swedish, one in Italian… I tried, but was not successful this time. Still, this is one of the
advantages of publishing this research journal on the internet. We have endless space to place
publications in any language here, just remember this, when you are about to complain about
the medium we chose for this enterprise!

What else do you need to know about this volume? I drew from Werner Kraus concerning the
selection of material: “The selecting criteria for the articles of this edition are not arranged along
the line of “good” or “bad” research.” No, it is available research at this point, I have to add.

The order in which they are presented is simply alphabetical after last name of first author. No
bigger secret to this, honestly. Shorter articles are presented as full text and as a pdf which you
can download on your computer and print easier. Longer articles and theses are available only
as pdf-download.

For articles that were published elsewhere before and where we had problems receiving
permission for reprint, we provide a link to the respective journal, so that you can find and
purchase it easily yourself, if you want to.

Well, that’s about it, I don’t want to add more here but send a big THANK YOU to Kathrin
Achenbach and Neil Schill, the web designers, Lynette Reid, my contact to the IFF board, as
well as the IFF board members themselves, in making this project possible.

Welcome to Volume 2 of the IFF Academy Feldenkrais Research Journal, give us feedback,
submit material and, come on guys, participate, end this few-women-show!

Sincerely,
Carolin Theuring

Introduction • Feldenkrais Research Journal, volume 2 (2005) 3


