معرفی
Dr Sarah Hopfinger is a part-time Research Lecturer at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland in the Research and Knowledge Exchange Department. She is a queer disabled artist-researcher whose work spans dance, live art, theatre, disability studies, crip theory, chronic pain, ecology, and intergenerational collaboration. Her practice integrates performance creation with academic research, producing work that challenges conventional understandings of disability, wildness, and ecological relationships.
Education:
- PhD in Performance (in) ecology: a practice-based approach, University of Glasgow (2012-2017)
- Visiting lecturer, University of Glasgow (2016-2018)
Sarah Hopfinger's research centers on disability dance, chronic pain, and crip theory, exploring how these intersect with ecological performance and intergenerational practice. Her work is philosophically grounded in two interconnected frameworks: a crip politics that celebrates disability as a valid lifeway, and ecological thinking that acknowledges humans' entanglement with nonhuman life. Through her performances and scholarly work, she investigates how chronic pain experiences can offer insights into ecological pain, how wildness manifests across generations, and how disability can reshape performance practices. Her research methodology is fundamentally practice-led, with performance outcomes serving as both artistic expression and research findings.
Scientific Awards:
- Athenaeum Award: Ecofutures (2019)
- Athenaeum Award: IETM and No Limits Festival (2019)
- Athenaeum Award: Working Creatively with Chronic Pain (2018)
- British Council: IETM and No Limits Festival (2019)
- Carnegie Trust Research Incentive Grant: Ecologies of Pain (2019)
Sarah is actively mentoring the next generation of researchers as she accepts PhD students with interests in disability/crip and performance/dance, chronic pain/illness studies, ecological performance, autobiography, devised performance, and intergenerational practice. She serves as co-investigator on the AHRC Future Ecologies: Producing Dance Network and continues to develop her Ecologies of Pain research project. Her creative practice operates as both scholarly contribution and public engagement, with her current touring piece 'Pain and I' receiving critical acclaim for its nuanced exploration of chronic pain experiences.
Her collaborative approach extends beyond academia to include partnerships with Battersea Arts Centre, South London Gallery, Platform, and various international festivals. These collaborations often involve diverse performers including children, non-trained dancers, and disabled artists, challenging conventional performance hierarchies and creating spaces for embodied knowledge production that values multiple ways of knowing and being.
