Practicing Forum Theatre: An Equity Tool
PSi develops leaders from the perspective of three lenses. Two of these lenses—Educator and Community-Based Leader—are easily accessible to most of the emerging education and nonprofit leaders who come to our program.
The third lens, however—Artist—typically raises some eyebrows, especially for those who don’t think of themselves as visual artists, musicians, actors, dancers, or creators in other domains. We ask PSi participants to adopt the Artist’s approach to leadership, accessing inspiration and using creativity, design, risk-taking, and experimentation to solve complex problems.
To this end, our Cohorts work with faculty member Will C., an internationally recognized practitioner of Playback Theatre, a community-building form of improvisation theater based on personal narratives. And we discuss the work of Augusto Boal, whose Forum Theatre, influenced by educator and theorist Paulo Freire, invites the audience into the action as a means of analysing and transforming their reality.
A few evenings ago, I was invited by PSi alum Sonia Lowe, Assistant Principal of the Saltonstall School in Salem MA, to see a powerful and moving example of this work in action.
Sonia's district is working on issues of equity and racial justice. They have been using Forum Theatre to invite teachers and students to try on what it takes to disrupt racist practices. The online performance I experienced left me in awe of the diverse group of teachers and students who participated, and I was blown away by the teachers’ willingness to be open and vulnerable and take risks, particularly in front of their students.
Masterfully facilitated by Emily Ullman, Director of Extended Learning Programs at Salem Public Schools, we began by witnessing a scene that presented an all-too-real classroom incident: a teacher challenges a student, and the student claims the teacher is picking on her just because she is Spanish. The teacher counters, “Are you calling me a racist?” And the situation escalates, with the paraprofessional and the principal both taking the teacher’s side.
This opening scene was an invitation to the 40+ person “audience” of teachers, district administrators and students to use the Forum Theatre process to step in, improvise, and “disrupt” the scene, trying out alternative responses to understand and transform the original outcome.
The various “disruptions” led to powerful reflections afterward and an amazing commitment on the part of every participant to stick with the conversation and work it through. The teacher was offended. The student felt picked on. The audience had to figure out what was going on and unpack the complexities of intention and impact that contribute to a system of oppression. In the moment, it doesn’t matter what you mean in your head. What matters is how the other person experiences it. That experience must be acknowledged and addressed, regardless of intentions. No one wants to be a racist; we are all on a journey to become anti-racist. The Artist’s lens—accessed here through theatre—provides a liberatory framework to try on new perspectives, build empathy, take risks, and experience new insights that get us closer to our destination.
And amazingly it was all on Zoom, and—given that we were all doing such challenging work—it was also really fun!
