Foundations Of Dance & Movement Therapy

Tripura Kashyap is a pioneer of Dance Movement Therapy (DMT) in India, in 1990, after training at the Hancock Centre for Creative Arts Therapies, Wisconsin, USA. She holds a B.A. in English Literature and an M.A. in Psychology, along with a First-Class Diploma in Bharatanatyam from Kalakshetra, Chennai, and a Diploma in Buddhism from Tibet House, Delhi. She was a long-standing performing artist with the Chandralekha Dance Company, Chennai, and later trained in dance theatre, choreography, and dance education through a six-week choreographers’ residency at the American Dance Festival, USA.

For over 35 years, Tripura has worked as a movement therapist in special schools, rehabilitation centres, and retirement homes. She has facilitated dance programmes within educational settings across India, including serving as a dance facilitator for the Newspaper in Education initiative of The Times of India. She has conducted numerous Dance in Education workshops for school teachers and was a Visiting Faculty for Dance Pedagogy at the University of Hyderabad. Internationally, she mentored the Dance in Education programme for Kalai Kaviri students (Trichy) in England and served as a consultant for the Dance-in-Education programme at the Attakkalari Centre for Movement Arts.

Tripura founded Rainbow Inc. and Apoorva Dance Theatre, through which she created contemporary dance works and collaborated with filmmakers, musicians, and visual artists on interdisciplinary performances. She is a co-founder of the Creative Movement Therapy Association of India (CMTAI) and serves as a teaching faculty member and supervisor for DMT Certificate, Postgraduate Diploma, and M.A. programmes across India. She has been a guest faculty at Ashoka University, Ambedkar University, and Christ University, and is currently an Adjunct Faculty member at the World University of Design, Sonipat.

Her contributions have been recognised through fellowships from Ashoka Innovators for the Public and the Indian Ministry of Culture, as well as a Lifetime Achievement Award from Sancheti Healthcare Academy and the Sarojini Naidu International Award. She is the author of My Body, My Wisdom, a book on dance therapy, and Contemporary Dance: Practices, Paradigms and Practitioners. Tripura has co-authored research papers, written extensively for newspapers, and presented her work through talks, lecture-demonstrations, and workshops at numerous national and international conferences.

Movement is more than physical action. It is a language through which emotions, memories, relationships, and lived experiences can be expressed, explored, and understood when words alone are not enough.