Word-Dancing Together Towards Noble Outcomes

Podcast Conversation on Embodiment and Communication - I was interviewed on 23 February 2026 by Jon Di Luca for his podcast Ki to the City , hosted on Substack. The conversation explores aikido as an embodied language of interaction and reflects on how practice-based knowledge can inform research and professional communication training. Across the episode, we discuss how aikido can be understood not only as a martial art but as a structured system of interactional meaning-making. Movement, timing, attention, and relational positioning function as communicative resources that shape how people engage with little common ground because of differences, tension, and challenges. Approached in this way, aikido offers a lens on communication that extends beyond verbal language and cognitive models. Ki to the City: Podcast by Jon Di Luca The dialogue also connects directly with themes central to my research and teaching: embodied learning, multimodal communication, and the development of profess...

Veel leidinggevenden kennen theorieën. Ze weten wat duidelijke communicatie is. Ze weten hoe feedback hoort te klinken. Maar wat gebeurt er wanneer het toch spannend wordt? Wanneer er geen tijd is. Wanneer weerstand opkomt. Wanneer emoties stijgen. Wanneer beslissingen druk zetten op mensen. Daar begint leidinggevend communiceren met body. Met body? Communicatie is geen puur cognitieve vaardigheid. Ze leeft in: ademhaling stem houding timing aanwezigheid spanningsniveau Wie hun lichaam niet meeneemt, verliest impact. Training met body betekent: leren voelen wanneer spanning oploopt leren vertragen vóór je reageert leren onderscheiden wat er werkelijk speelt leren kiezen hoe je reageert Dat is de basis van matuur communiceren ,  ongeacht leeftijd, functie of anciënniteit. Maturiteit heeft weinig te maken met jaren ervaring. Ze heeft alles te maken met bewustzijn, zelfbeheersing en verantwoordelijkheid voor je impact. Matuur leidersch...

Mijn keynotes zijn denkopeners met een wetenschappelijke ruggengraat. Ze kunnen gebracht worden als keynote, publiekslezing of denksessie, afhankelijk van de context. De volgende reeks bestaat uit vier lezingen die elk op zichzelf kunnen staan en tegelijk samen een doorlopende reflectie vormen over taal, cultuur, interactie en betekenis. De keynotes kunnen in het Nederlands, Engels, Duits en eventueel Frans. Keynotes met ruggengraat | Greet Angèle De Baets 1. Interculturele communicatie onder de loep Wat we echt nodig hebben v oorbij clichés over kennis van taal en cultuur Interculturele communicatie is geen niche. We doen ze dagelijks, vaak zonder het zo te benoemen: in alledaagse ontmoetingen, in professionele samenwerking. Soms loopt ze vanzelf, soms loopt ze vast. In deze lezing onderzoek ik wat interculturele communicatie precies is en waarom sommige populaire ideeën te eenvoudig blijken. Wat hebben mensen werkelijk nodig om intercultureel competent te handelen? Meer talenkennis...

How can you make professional communication training at once more engaging, easier to understand, and more memorable? That question was central to a research project that ran from December 2022 to December 2023. All participants took part in a communication training programme based on an interaction model developed from recent research. This model was implemented differently across groups: some groups worked exclusively with cognitive knowledge transfer and exercises, while others combined the model with explicitly embodied movements and principles drawn from aikido. From Training to Publication The analysis of the results has since been published. This process took time, as is typical of rigorous academic research. The article went through a double-blind peer-review procedure: independent experts assessed the study anonymously, without knowing who the authors were, while the authors in turn did not know the identity of the reviewers. This procedure guarantees a critical, careful, and ...

The Association for Business Communication (ABC)  brings together scholars, educators, and practitioners who share a commitment to advancing business communication research, teaching, and practice worldwide. Left to right: Greet Angèle De Baets, Gail Flanagan, and Marlies Whitehouse Taken during the 90th International ABC Conference in Long Beach, California, October 2025 ABC operates through a strong international network, with regional representations across the globe, including Europe, Middle East, and Africa ( EMEA) . From 2026 onwards, Marlies Whitehouse (Switzerland) will take up the role of Regional Vice-President EMEA, succeeding Ursula Lutzky (Austria). I would like to thank Ursula for her sustained commitment and leadership over the past years, and I warmly welcome Marlies in her new role.  My sincere appreciation also goes to the many members who actively shape this community through their work and engagement, including colleagues such as  Gail Flanagan ...

In communication training, learning outcomes are often framed in terms of techniques: better questions, clearer arguments, more effective structures. In our mixed-methods study on aikido-based communication training, however, participants consistently described something different. They spoke of eye-openers , surprising insights , and experiences that continued to resonate long after the training ended. Physical interaction: Powerful understanding Rather than listing newly acquired techniques, many participants characterised what they learned as edifying : physically learning from the aikido as a theoretical model for interaction and communication. The following excerpt is taken word for word from our article: When screening the open-text answers, most participants in the aikido-embodied groups reported that they found the interaction skills they learned to be edifying: ‘gave a few eye-openers in conducting conversations’ (Nina, Aikido-Embodied Group D), ‘a very interesting experience...