No description available.

No description available.

There was Vietnam in books. And this war and that war. And is war just? And is justice fair? And is there poetry there? Anywhere? In pockets, around certain corners? On buses? In gardens? On Sundays? And there where? And there why? And says who? And--we should talk about it more. Why don't we talk about war?

Surrendering to what is the nature of compassion, the power of silence, a true commitment to the character, a complete freedom of the imagination, and the will, at any given moment, to let go of who we think we are in order to become who we are meant to be - has been the greatest teacher of all. .-Eckhart Tolle

No description available.

The mass of words written about the German poet and prose writer Heinrich Heine (1?97-1856) is intimidating. He is considered to be one of the most controversial and paradoxical authors of the Western literature, an enigmatic figure among German writers, and the only German writer between Goethe and Thomas Mann to achieve during his lifetime a reputation beyond the bounds of German-speaking countries. He has been termed "the pioneer of radical political literature, an eccentric poet." His works became a milestone of German thought.

acase@tulane.edu / This thesis focuses on the process and collaborative methodology of design-led, devised theatre to achieve an innovative, visually arresting theatrical show. A devised theatrical production is a non-traditional form in which the performative material is generated in collaboration with the cast, director and designers, without a pre-existing script. This theatrical work entitled Clytemnestra, is based on the Ancient Greek classical plays The Oresteia by Aeschylus. I strove to investigate design-based strategies for devising performance, capturing and exploring the emotional experience of the characters and world. These included Clytemnestra’s experience of loss, longing, love and madness. The aim of this project was to explore the process where costume, puppetry, lighting and scenic design elements initiate the devised process and to investigate the intersectionality of these mediums. The thesis has taken the form of a two-year writing and design process, a twelve-week design build, a six-week rehearsal process, and culminated in a theatrical production that visually and performatively showcased this process in April 2018. / 1 / Hannah Lax

Master of Education (Research) / Using arts-informed/narrative inquiry as its methodology, this thesis examines the creation of a performance text using verbatim theatre techniques. The play, Remembering One Day in December, evolved from the interweaving of personal narratives taken from volunteer participants, who were impacted by the 1999 Glenbrook Rail Disaster, when a crowded commuter train collided with the almost stationary Indian Pacific. It also includes documentary extracts from the first of three Public Inquiries into the event. From multiple perspectives, yet with shared motifs, the play tells the story of the day, the disillusionment with anticipated trauma support and concludes with the participants’ slow but inspiring journeys towards healing. The thesis also explores the increasing interest in performance as a research tool, because of its capacity to comprehensively present a multiplicity of complex truths. Also at this time of centralized media ownership and homogenized, reductionist media content, this thesis also suggests that the verbatim theatre form, so particularly dependent on complex cultural narratives, could be evolving as a bridge between mainstream stages and community concerns, where community can be either global or regional and some of its concerns are no longer the province of news and current affairs. Lastly this thesis offers the researcher an opportunity to reflexively examine the editing process in the construction of the play text. It describes the researcher’s journey from interviewer to story custodian and analyses how this shift in relationship affected the text’s content and structure, where the intention to deliver an authentic and compelling piece of verbatim theatre remained paramount.

This thesis is an examination of rehearsal processes and aesthetic outcomes in community theatre practice. It is a qualitative study, focusing on a community theatre project in a small outer suburban primary school near Melbourne, Australia. The researcher is a highly involved reflective practitioner, taking on the multiple roles of researcher, community artist and community member. / At the heart of the thesis is a novella embodying a range of perspectives and experiences from the case study. / The study began with the questions: how is it possible for a community theatre project to satisfy the participants’ artistic and community needs and what are the factors which contribute to the achievement of these ends? The tension between the contrasting needs and experiences of different participants, ranging from theatrically trained artistic facilitators to the children who struggle to be heard, to the parents looking to connect with the school community, informed the study. The inevitable challenges and difficulties of the fieldwork propelled the study into a wider exploration of questions of community participation in the arts as a means of individual and collective expression and as an experience of cultural democracy. / Drawing on an extensive review of theoretical foundations underpinning the practice of community theatre, and a review of practice itself (both the researcher’s own and a range of exemplars), the study proposes an analysis of the key stages of development of community theatre practice. / This analysis has been synthesised into a Community Theatre Matrix. At the core of the matrix is the notion that collective community art-making takes place within an Engaged Space, where key elements of Artistry, Agency, Pedagogy, Pragmatics and Critical Reflection shape and inform the practice. Those who choose to participate in the collective art-making process become a temporary community of art-makers. / This Engaged Space is based on the conceptualisation of a ‘community aesthetic’ - participants engage in collective art-making processes predicated on an invitation to aesthetic and social engagement. Such a space is charged with the potential for a politicising experience as well as a community one. This new understanding is framed by an appreciation of the interplay between artistic invention (and intervention) and pedagogy. In order to give voice to the silent community, the artist employs the tools of emancipatory pedagogy along with modernist and post-modernist theatre understandings. / The thesis concludes with the proposition that community theatre offers individuals and communities the possibility of a shared experience of art-making and the social and artistic possibilities associated with ‘giving voice and being heard’.

In this dissertation, I read Judith Thompsons The Crackwalker, I am Yours, Habitat, and Lion in the Streets with an eye towards how Thompson produces socially contingent spaces as sites of marginalized identity. My focus is on Thompsons work as a playwright rather than on the texts in performance. My interest is in the ways Thompson mediates a characterization of class-based marginality through the experience of space as a social product. In interrogating Thompsons use of space, I refer to the theories of philosopher Henri Lefebvre, specifically to the notion of space as a social product and his conception of the double illusion.