ESJ, very broadly, includes a range of healing modalities, also referred to as “politicized somatics” or “embodied activism”
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ESJ is not a “new” field, and indeed has roots back to what might be imagined as longstanding conversation, often occurring at the margins of particular human communities. ESJ as an emerging and constantly changing field that is, at the same time, ancient.
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ESJ theory and practice is likewise grounded in a long lineage of activism, artistic production, and scholarship as well as radical, liberatory frameworks developed by those who have been systematically marginalized, disenfranchised, and denied the kind of safety, dignity, and belonging that Haines (2019) places at the heart of embodied social justice.
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ESJ, in the present, is also fueled by an increasingly vibrant dialogue centering critiques of the ways in which “embodiment spaces” (yoga, ecstatic dance, somatic psychotherapy, meditation, martial arts communities, organizations, institutions, and events) are often characterized by cultural appropriation, lack of diversity, and lack of social analysis. At the same time, finally, ESJ engages explicitly with the lack of attention towards embodied experience within “movement spaces,” where activism is fueled by a sense of urgency and moral self-sacrifice.
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ESJ is led predominantly by Black and or nonbinary/queer practitioner-scholars.