Oldal 124 [124]
AN EXAMPLE AND THE QUESTIONS IT RAISES
is watched in role by those who are not part of the prosecution improvisation.
During the encounter the CSOs realise that the child in the family has cerebral
palsy, which creates a new view point on the meaning behind the sentences
in the transcript and whether they were referring to the condition or actual
violence. The CSOs need to respond to this new situation on their feet.
Davis’s Comments on the Lesson
Davis says that “the centre of the drama raises the question of whether or
not social problems can be resolved by laws: does law lead to justice?”.4
He aims to explore this question from within the story rather than in a more
distanced reflective way. Besides emphasis on the internal coherence of tasks
Davis identifies the ‘angle of connection’ of the participants to the story as
a key component of his planning. In this case the drama was created for
experienced teachers being trained in drama, mostly women and some men,
many of whom had children; these adults were invited to play trainee Child
Support Officers. The participants also were given space through specific tasks
to build the fictional world and bring in personal narratives if they wanted to.
These and many other elements helped in creating the sense of being in two
worlds at the same time, the metaxis Davis explicitly aims for.***
He quotes reactions of some adult participants in the child abuse drama.
One male participant said: “I felt I was two persons in one thinking about
the conflict between law and humanity which rose up from the decision I had
to make in the drama which was to save a child by the name of the law.”#
A woman participant said: “I thought on the one hand as a mother and
having a child and on the other as a child protection officer and in both roles
thinking, how should I protect her?” Both reactions show a clash between
the values of the participants in reality and the values taken on in the fictional
role, suggesting a questioning of both. The final event of this drama seems
to be constructed so that participants can become aware of how they were
taken over by the ideology linked to their fictional task. In the other examples
metaxis enhances seeing how the socio-political context influences people’s
thinking and actions. Davis states that “drama needs to be able to involve us
in such a way that we meet ourselves giving us the possibility of reworking
the ideology that has entered us: the possibility of glimpsing how society has
corrupted us”.“®’ In the Child Abuse Drama Davis creates a structure that
453 Tbid., 120.
454 Tbid., 53.
455 Ibid., 120.
456 Ibid.
#7 Ibid., 43.
+ 123 +