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CHAPTER FIVE: DATA ANALYSIS
dramaturgical structures I identified in Bond’s plays that they could use
within the improvisations. Based on the underlying dramaturgical structures
pinpointed and explained in detail in chapter two of this book I created a list
of practically implementable structures that I shared with participants at some
point in the lessons. The first list consisted of seven items which I later simplified
to the following four (I have added an example to make them more accessible
here from The Children, a Bond play discussed in detail in chapter two):
I. Unexpected/extreme action — a completely unexpected action, that
can be extreme because it is so unexpected, or because it expresses
something deeply supressed but present behind the situation.
An example from The Children: The Man being carried by the children
says “My son, my son” and cradles the brick that is from his burnt
house and which he uses to kill the children.
II. Turning social roles upside down — social roles assign an ‘expected’
behaviour — this is how a parent should behave etc. These can be played
with, contradicted, or can slip off at moments. An example from
The Children: The Mother asks her son (Joe) to burn a house down and
explains why it is in the interest of the Joe to do it.
III. Creating gap in time or space or meaning — using language (foreign
language, sounds, gibberish), time (pace) and the physical space to open
gaps in meaning in the situation by creating contradictions. An example
from The Children: The Man says “hgn” after smothering one of
the children with a towel and smacking her on the head with a brick.
IV. Everyday objects that are familiar to us can create a useful focus
point if they are used in any of the structures above. An example from
The Children: The brick which is used in the first scene by Joe to whack
his doll, is also used to swear on by the whole group. And the Man also
uses a brick to take his revenge.
While I am fully aware of the dangers of identifying and using just some
elements of a complexly connected body of artistic work, I thought that
these three components: an aim for creating drama, a Centre of investigation
and dramaturgical structures together can offer a usable but also coherent
aesthetic grounding for participants of the drama lessons.
I also decided to work with secondary school aged students in this cycle,
because I wanted to explore these complex ideas without having to deal with
the issues arising from age that could divert the focus of the research. Testing
various frameworks that allow the inclusion of these structures in the drama
lessons was an important aim. One section of the data analysis looks at
the frameworks I implemented in this process. First, I offer a short summary
of the lessons conducted in this cycle.
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