In this commentary, summarized from a recent interview, the author shares insights and memories from a career devoted to drama and performance studies. He enthusiastically recounts events, initiatives, and collaborations that have helped sustain his lifelong passion for performance.

Emily Hockley, of Cambridge University Press, and Margaret Bartley, of Bloomsbury Publishing, highlight the way that working directly with scholars, students and digital resources creators, through partnerships and collaborative relationships, has helped to frame the current form of their respective online platforms. While the focus of the debate…

The word "performance" is the basis for our medium. It's what we work toward, look forward to, and talk about with endless fervor. But does this word, this concept, this idea, actually stifle learning, artistic expression, and growth? As a director and professor of theatre for the past 13 years, I have watched this word become the knave…

Ryerson University theatre professor Natalie Alvarez is currently helming a large, interdisciplinary team in southern Ontario that is testing the power of Forum Theatre to build better, more responsive scenarios for police officer training in de-escalation and mental crisis response. In this interview, Alvarez sits down with issue editor Kim Solga…

Reverend Father Professor Amechi Nicholas Akwanya is one of the towering scholars of literature in Nigeria and elsewhere in the world. For decades, and still counting, Fr. Prof. Akwanya has worked arduously, professing literature by way of teaching, researching, and writing in the Department of English and Literary Studies of the University of…

The three papers and the pictorial essay that follow Rustom Bharucha's keynote all originated at "Theatre Applications" (Central School of Speech and Drama, London, April 2010). One theme of the conference was "cultural geographies of dislocation, place and space"; the three papers and pictorial essay respond to that theme. All…

Professors from American University and artists and educators from Imagination Stage, a children's theater and arts-education organization in nearby Bethesda, Maryland, have combined their intellectual and artistic strengths over the past 12 years to create an arts-integrated educational program for elementary and secondary schools throughout the…

The acting out of personal experiences with bullying promotes compassion and allows all students, including bullies, victims and witnesses, to stand up for justice. Playback theaters interpret personal experiences in a creative, nonconfrontational and nonjudgmental way, demonstrating to students that the playback stage is a safe place where they…

In this article, the author discusses how to consolidate schools where enrollment have dropped significantly. In addition to financial concerns, effective and developmentally appropriate curriculum choices are important. The author states that the "core" academic courses must be offered no matter the configuration of the schools, but…

An organic approach to style in acting can lend credibility and power to performances and can enhance the clarity and extent of what is communicated to audiences about other social worlds. The organic approach is based on the following principles: mental experience and expressive behavior are inseparable and reciprocal; experience in either mode…

Teaching is strenuous enough without requiring educators to be entertaining as well. (LH)

Argues that theater instructors must also be artistic directors. Relates one instructor's experiences in taking over the acting and directing program at the Los Angeles High School of the Performing Arts and how his changing attitudes were reflected in his restructuring of the program. (PA)

The Young Playwrights' Festival is a project of the Dramatists Guild, New York City, for young writers aged 8-18. This article discusses the Festival of 10 plays written by children and presented professionally at New York City's Circle Rep Theatre and the playwriting workshops for children taught by project director Gerald Chapman. (PD)

States that undergraduate theater students typically approach their required courses in theater history with apprehension. Argues that, with the introduction of new methodologies in theater history, it is time to inspect the place of the survey course in the curriculum and to review the particular demands placed upon the teacher of theater…

Offers insights, discoveries, and practical suggestions (collected during 16 years of experience) on how to successfully direct and teach high school actors. (SR)