Human Rights Education Through Movement and Gestures—Challenges and Opportunities for Embodied Teaching Approaches in Higher Education

Current studies suggest that embodied teaching and learning can enhance knowledge acquisition in higher education and support long-term retention. However, despite the increasing recognition of these benefits, there remain significant knowledge gaps—especially concerning the challenges and opportunities for multidisciplinary educator teams in developing and conducting embodied exercises in class. These gaps extend to legal education, where little attention has been paid to emerging issues when embedding movement and gestures into the study of human rights law. This practice note intends to contribute to the required exchange of experiences by sharing the challenges, opportunities, and lessons learned by a multidisciplinary team—composed of academics, a dancer, and a musician, in developing and delivering the pilot course ‘Rights Moves - Embodied Legal Learning’ at the Faculty of Law of Johannes Kepler University Linz (Austria). The experimental course formed part of the ‘TRANSFORM’ funding scheme of the Austrian Federal Ministry of Education, Science, and Research, which aimed to explore innovative teaching formats to better prepare students for the complexities of contemporary society.