Drama Tuesday - This is my IDEA DREAM from the IDEA 2022 Congress.
/With 30 years of IDEA there is still one unresolved issue of drama/theatre education… (well, to be honest, probably more than one, but let’s focus on just one!)
The issue is captured in the awkward English naming of IDEA – the International Drama/Theatre and Education Association. It’s a mouthful in English. And it is avoided in other versions of the association name.
What is the name of the field?
Is the term “drama”?
Or, is it “theatre”?
Does it matter!
Is it just an issue of language and terminology? Or are there underlying cultural, social, pedagogical and even political issues and tensions that are fundamentally significant.
IDEA seeks always to be inclusive. And strives to be careful in the use of language. Hence the difficult wording in the English naming of IDEA. But my tongue stumbles over it every time. It has been a long discussed project but now, I suggest, a necessary one.
IDEA could be the point where there is a bringing together a commonly shared and understood language about our field. One starting point, I suggest, is to collect from all places and points of view the ways that drama education is named and explained. Putting it all in one place would be a starting point.
What sorts of questions would be the starting point?
What do you call your work: drama education? Or theatre education? Or, something else?
List (and briefly explain) 5 key terms that you use that are central to your practice.
Identify (and briefly say why) up to 5 significant practitioners in your field that shape your work.
What other questions would we ask ourselves as a community?
This is above all not about trying to homogenise the language. Not to normalise or make practice common. It is rather, the need to recognise and celebrate our differences and recognise our shared connections while making our dialogues even easier and creating community.
