This article explores the connection between dance and politics through reflection on the process of writing a thesis about those two fields. Similarities and differences in the educational and disciplinary processes of academic practice and dance training are brought out, while focusing on the technique developed by Martha Graham: in particular the concepts of contraction and release are discussed in terms of their significance for training in academic practice in the humanities. Thinking of dance as a critically reflective practice is argued to have significant possibilities for our conception of a different way of doing politics while focusing on human rights as an affirmative concept.