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FACILITATING ‘BEING’ IN THE SITUATION — STRUCTURES USED IN LTD AND BONDIAN DRAMA
present reality need to be recognizable for those watching or participating.
This is especially important in relation to the problems engaged in in
the fictional world. The central problem examined through the play should
be related to the elements that connect Site A and Site B. The Centre has
been defined as the essential confrontation behind the dramatic problem,”
so the previous question can be developed further to include the Centre as
a part of Site B as the following: In what forms are the essential conflicts of our
current socio-cultural reality present in the specific situations of the story?
The analysis can also start from looking at the current reality and locating
those essential confrontations or contradictions that would be useful to
engage in within the fiction. They then need to be included in the situations
of the story through specific incidents or ‘givens’ of the fiction.
Site C is related to how these events are presented through actions,
images and the use of objects to open the essential conflicts in a way that
the audience, or in the case of a drama lesson the participants, can make
meaning of them within the story but independently of the explanations
that the story’s narrative provides. While Site B relates more to what is being
explored, Site C is concerned with how it is being explored.
Site D highlights the purpose of the dramatic exploration and emphasises
that the situations need to connect with the imaginative processes of
the individual audience members or participants. The drama teacher or
director needs to take into consideration her audience as individuals who are
members of a group in both an educational and a theatrical setting.
The concept of Site as a whole provides a logic for the actors and the audience
to engage in a fiction world, because that is connected to the social reality we
live in but provides specific situations and events through which contradictions
of the social reality can be explored.
The concept of Site can be linked to the concept of ‘angle of connection
from LTD that refers to the connection between the fictional situation
and the real-life situation of the participants of the lesson. If employed
in an educational setting Site can be perceived as a wider framework that
incorporates the ‘angle of connection’, and can be used in the planning
process of a drama lesson as well.
Situations are the basic building blocks of drama. Stories are presented
through situations and the concept of Site can also be realised through them.
Both Bondian and LT drama enhance engagement with problems through
situations. I discuss these in the next section.
3497
496 Bond: Letters 3, 166.
“7 Davis: Imagining the Real, 78.