How Theatre Educates : Convergences and Counterpoints with Artists, Scholars, and Advocates

__How Theatre Educates__ is a fascinating and lively inquiry into pedagogy and practice that will be relevant to teachers and students of drama, educators, artists working in theatre, and the theatre-going public.

Canada boasts a remarkable number of talented theatre artists, scholars, and educators. How Theatre Educates brings together essays and other contributions from members of these diverse communities to advocate for a broader and more inclusive understanding of theatre as an educative force.

Organized to reflect the variety of contexts in which professionals are making, researching, and teaching drama, this anthology presents a wide range of articles, essays, reminiscences, songs, poems, plays, and interviews to elucidate the relationship between theatre practice and pedagogy, and to highlight the overriding theme: namely, that keeping 'education' – with its curriculum components of dramatic literature and theatre studies in formal school settings – separate from 'theatre' outside of the classroom, greatly diminishes both enterprises.

In this volume, award-winning playwrights, directors, actors, and scholars reflect on the many ways in which those working in theatre studios, school classrooms, and on stages throughout the country are engaged in teaching and learning processes that are particular to the arts and especially genres of theatre. Situating theatre practitioners as actors in a larger socio-cultural enterprise, How Theatre Educates is a fascinating and lively inquiry into pedagogy and practice that will be relevant to teachers and students of drama, educators, artists working in theatre, and the theatre-going public.

Contributors

• Maja Ardal
• David Booth
• Patricia Cano
• Diane Flacks
• Kathleen Gallagher
• John Gilbert
• Sky Gilbert
• Jim Giles
• Linda Griffiths
• Tomson Highway
• Janice Hladki
• Cornelia Hoogland
• Ann-Marie MacDonald
• Lori McDougall
• John Murrell
• Domenico Pietropaolo
• Walter Pitman
• Richard Rose
• Jason Sherman
• Lynn Slotkin
• Larry Swartz
• Judith Thompson
• Guillermo Verdecchia
• Belarie Zatzman

Contents 7 Preface 11 I. INTRODUCTION 15 Emergent Conceptions in Theatre Pedagogy and Production 15 Towards an Understanding of Theatre for Education 26 II. THEATRE, THE ARTS, PEDAGOGY, AND PERFORMANCE 37 'I Will Tear You to Pieces': The Classroom as Theatre 37 The Monologue Project: Drama as a Form of Witnessing 47 The Professional Theatre and the Teaching of Drama in Ontario Universities 68 National Symposium on Arts Education: Opening Address, 1-2 July 2001 79 III. CRITICAL VOICES 101 The Poetics: A Play 101 Confessions of a Theatre Addict 112 Inside Out: Notes on Theatre in a Tenderized, Tranquillized, 'Mediatized' Society 118 Improvisation and Risk: A Dialogue with Linda Griffiths 126 IV. CULTURE, COMMUNITY, AND THEATRE PRACTICES 145 Seven Things about Cahoots Theatre Projects 145 Negotiating Drama Practices: Struggles in Racialized Relations of Theatre Production and Theatre Research 156 Drama through the Eyes of Faith 174 As the World Turns: The Changing Role of Popular Drama in International Development Education 185 The Other Side of Alternative Theatre: An Interview with Sky Gilbert 194 V. THEATRE FOR AND WITH YOUNG AUDIENCES 203 Theatre for Young Audiences and Grown-up Theatre: Two Solitudes 203 Theatre for Young People: Does It Matter? 210 The Incredible Adventures of Mary Jane Mosquito: Lyrics to Tatty Cake9 219 The Land inside Coyote: Reconceptualizing Human Relationships to Place through Drama 223 VI. CREATIVE PROCESSES, AUDIENCE, AND FORM 243 The Significance of Theatre: A Commencement Address 243 Education through Empathy: Using Laughter as a Way In 251 Intellectual Passions, Feminist Commitments, and Divine Comedies: A Dialogue with Ann-Marie MacDonald 259 Contributors 281 References 287