Social Awareness at the School of Playback Theatre

At the School we are deeply committed to social justice and increasing the awareness of our students to issues of cultural difference and prejudice, especially concerning race, economic background, and gender.

This topic has become more important in recent years because the School has become more diverse. In turn, the School has become more diverse because we are working hard to make it that way—because we want to be part of the change towards a more equitable world. This means primarily doing our own work, of course.

In this memo, I want to set forth some concepts to guide you as you teach at the School.

Firstly, we try to maintain the same balance of art, social interaction, and ritual in our courses as is necessary for a good performance of playback theatre. What this means practically is that we place considerable emphasis on group process and adjusting the mood to the program. Relationships are as important as content. (This balance is in contrast to most pedagogy, in which an emphasis on content dominates.)

At the core of the Playback value system is the belief that everyone’s story is of value. This means always being sensitive in your work to whose voice is unheard, or heard less than others.

With students who belong to minority groups that may be discriminated against in the society at large, we have a special responsibility to not repeat the offense in our courses. In fact, I believe we want to make an effort, within sensible bounds, to redress society’s wrong by giving extra voice to students who may be silenced in the larger society.

At the same time, we cannot forget the core value—everyone’s story is deserving—even from the majority voices, even stories belonging to students relatively unaware of their privilege.

How to build awareness? The best way is through the playback work itself. This means having the courage to go in depth into redoing stories whose enactment may have been problematic through stereotyping, or being afraid to act truthfully.