• Source: Elsa Gindler

Elsa Gindler (19 June 1885 – 8 January 1961) was a somatic bodywork pioneer in Germany.
Born in Berlin, teacher of gymnastik, student of Hedwig Kallmeyer (who, in turn, had been a student of Genevieve Stebbins).
From her personal experience of recovering from tuberculosis (it is said by concentrating on breathing only with her healthy lung and resting the diseased lung), Gindler originated a school of movement education, in close collaboration with Heinrich Jacoby.
What Gindler had called Arbeit am Menschen (work on the human being) emphasised self-observation and growing understanding of one's individual physically related condition. Simple actions such as sitting, standing, and walking were explored, as well as other everyday movements.
This became one of the bases of body psychotherapy since many of the most influential body psychotherapists studied with her or "Sensory Awareness" with Charlotte Selver at the Esalen Institute around 1962.
During the Nazi-period of Germany, Gindler used these investigations and experimental exercises with her students to covertly help people who were persecuted by the regime.




Students and Collaborators


Gindler's collaborators included

Emmi Pikler
Heinrich Jacoby (whose students included Moshe Feldenkrais)
Several of Gindler's students went on to become influential teachers themselves:

Elsa Lindenberg (partner of Wilhelm Reich)
Laura Perls (wife of Fritz Perls and co-creator of Gestalt Therapy)
Charlotte Selver (Sensory Awareness)
Carola Speads (Physical Re-Education) (Berta Bobath) Bobath concept
Gertrud Heller
Lily Ehrenfried (Methode Ehrenfried / Gymnastique Holistique)
Clare Fenichel
Sophie Ludwig (1901–1997)
Ruth Matter (1904–1995)
Gindler's student Charlotte Selver emigrated to the United States in 1938, and later became one of the first teachers at
Esalen Institute where she would frequently credit Gindler. Through Selver's Sensory Awareness workshops
at Esalen and elsewhere, Gindler's work indirectly influenced most of the somatic teachers in the United States.




Sources


History of Esalen Institute
German Wikipedia article on Elsa Gindler (translation requested)




References






External links


in German:

Swiss Association for Elsa Gindler/Heinrich Jacoby
Jacoby/Gindler Foundation Germany
Ways of Development, German Association working on pedagogy following Gindler/Jacoby
Ruth Matter Foundation
in English:

Emmi Pikler, The Emmi Pikler Institute US-website
Sensory Awareness Foundation

Kata Kunci Pencarian:

• Elsa Gindler
• Heinrich Jacoby
• Somatic experiencing
• Somatics
• Moshé Feldenkrais
• Charlotte Selver
• Basic body-awareness methodology
• Rosen Method Bodywork
• Gerda Alexander
• Emmi Pikler