Oldal 243 [243]
CHAPTER SIX: CONTEXT AND FURTHER USE OF THE FINDINGS OF MY ACTION RESEARCH
the opposite of what the lessons in my research aimed to achieve. Ihough
the NGO staff in the Wild Child drama can be considered as experts in some
sense, the problem posed by the feral child they undertook to educate became
a crisis they had to deal with as part of the unfolding narrative. Ihe frame
I offered to participants, a theatre exploration to create DEs, put the focus on
engaging with the problem within the situation and exploring what possible
questions can be brought out of it, rather than finding the solutions. These
two aspects of relating to the problem in the fiction are important factors of
difference between my research lessons and a MoE drama lesson.
The other reinterpretation of LTD is the Conventions approach that is
based on dramatic forms compiled by Neelands and Goode in Structuring
Drama Work aiming to “democratise drama teaching by identifying and
describing the common techniques and conventions used by great but often
mysterious drama educators”.”’ Neelands defines this mode of drama as
“a ‘laboratory theatre’ approach in which some aspect of human behaviour or
experience is isolated and selected for close exploration”.’”°® He also states that
they aimed to take “a more Brechtian or epic realist approach to drama””* in
offering these forms to drama teachers. While I used some of the forms that
are described in Structuring Drama Work in my research lessons, there were
two fundamental differences with Neelands between the underlying attitude
to drama. One of these was that while the Conventions approach aims to
create some degree of distancing by relying on Brechtian reflection, I aimed
to create the experience of ‘being’ in the drama and exploring the situation
from within. The other difference is that while the conventions described
by Neelands rely on the forms used by “post-naturalist theatres”’® I built
the connection between theatre and classroom drama by incorporating
underlying concepts, theory and dramaturgical structures. While I aimed
to keep the complexity of the theatre approach by relying on three different
elements of its artistry, the convention approach relies mostly on the form of
the theatre it connects with.
As can be seen the approach I used shares elements with contemporary
forms of drama, but can be clearly differentiated as well from them. It is part
of a large body of work, a new one among the many re-interpretations of LTD,
which has an exciting history and also a significant present. My work can be
defined as a reinterpretation of Living Through Drama that visibly rekindles
the connection with theatre form and theory and aims to make participants
able to use theatre to explore how socio-political narratives impact on
individuals. The thesis provides a significant new model of including differing
a
57 Neelands: Prologue, xvii.
Neelands: Beginning Drama, 64.
Neelands: Prologue, xviii.
Neelands: Beginning Drama, 64.
a
58
759
760
+ 242 +