In Quest for Drama in Open Education: Incentives, challenges and traps

Athens, 25/11/2018, Workshop, Ana Marjanovic-Shane, Ljubica Beljanski-Ristic, Jelena Stojiljković, Aleksandra Jelić

In Quest for Drama in Open Education: Incentives, challenges and traps

Athens, 25/11/2018

Ana Marjanovic-Shane, independent scholar, professor of Education, USA
Ljubica Beljanski-Ristic, founder, ex-President and honorary member of the Center for Drama in Education and Art- CEDEUM, Serbia
Jelena Stojiljković, Serbian Language and Literature teacher, Serbia
Aleksandra Jelić, founder, president and theatre director of the ApsArt Centre for Theatre Research, Serbia

Workshop 2,5 hours
Part of the 2018 ATHENS GREECE INTERNATIONAL THEATRE/DRAMA & EDUCATION CONFERENCE
organised by the Hellenic Theatre/Drama & Education Network (TENet-Gr)

Language: English

Our workshop is based on the concept of hybrid forms which join different spheres of human interest and activity, with divergent purposes, ideologies, expectations about relationships, evaluations meanings, etc., thus expanding the spaces of action, impact and values. Our aim is to explore several key tensions arising from this hybridity in the interaction between drama/performing arts and education.  Specifically we will explore the following: a) tensions between the two key purposes of drama in education: its aesthetic/artistic purposes vs. its diverse educational purposes; b) tensions between two different kinds of expertise: the artistic (directors, actors, writers, etc.) vs. the educational (teachers); c) tensions between authoritarian vs. authorial regimes in relationships among participants; d) the struggle for the legitimacy of the creative and reflective transcendence in education and society; and e) tensions between creative vs. critical authorship in drama in education. The workshop is jointly led by four professionals in the drama/theater in education and in dialogic pedagogy, through interactional sharing of their personal stories and professional experience with the participants. We use selected dramatic structures, videos and dialogic forms to start creative interactions and critical reflections – aiming to generate provocations for opening new interactional spaces where all participants may re-examine and re-define their own individual and shared opinions, standpoints, values and desires regarding the status of drama/theatre and performing arts in education. We also use multiple drama/theatre in education structures/techniques developed and applied by many other experts, explorers, artists and teachers who inspired educational practitioners to believe in the meaning, the value, the importance and the power of drama/theater and other performing arts when creating visions of hope for a better world, especially in these troubled and turbulent times, despite their many challenges and traps. It is particularly intended for drama teachers, theater artists, educational and theater researchers and other experts involved in the field of drama/theater and performing arts in education.

Ana Marjanovic-Shane is an Independent Scholar, Professor of Education, and a deputy editor-in-chief of Dialogic Pedagogy: An International Online Journal (http://dpj.pitt.edu). She received a doctorate from the University of Pennsylvania, USA. Her main professional interests and research are focused on: dialogic meaning making and creativity in human development and education, democratic dialogic education from and for agency, play and its humanizing potentials in education, dialogic relationships in educational events, drama and art in education, teaching as conceptual art, etc. Her articles in English and Serbian were published in various journals (e.g. "Mind, Culture, Activity Journal", "Learning, Culture and Social Interaction", “Dialogic Pedagogy Journal”) and as book chapters in books on play and education. Two of her recent publications are “Spoilsport” in drama education vs. dialogic pedagogy in Dialogic Pedagogy: An International Online Journal, 4, A45-A80, 2016 and soon to be published, Matusov, E. &Marjanovic-Shane, A., Teaching as dialogic conceptual art, in press, Knowledge Cultures. She lives and works in the USA. 

Ljubica Beljanski-Ristic was born in Bolzano, Italy. She lived and was schooled in Pula, Croatia, where she finished a Teacher Education School and a Pedagogical Academy. She received her degree in Literature and language from the University of Belgrade, Serbia, where she lives and works since 1971. Since 1997, she worked in a Cultural Center "Stari grad”, where she started a program of drama workshops and participation theatre for/with children and youth. She created many cultural programs for young professionals and artists to support their continuing education in practice and research projects in the areas of creative education, drama in education and theatre for cultural change. She is a founder of the Center for drama in education and art – CEDEUM (National IDEA center). She has been actively engaged in reforms in education and culture, since 2000 through introducing and integrating drama in the Serbian public education. She developed a concept of “polyphony” for a side program of Belgrade International Theatre Festival of new theatrical tendencies BITEF - the Bitef Polyphony. She was coordinator and artistic director of national and international projects and coordinator for Serbia of the EU project DICE Drama improves Lisbon Key Competences in Education. She also works as a consultant at the Institute for the study of cultural development, in the project “Cultural participation and cultural heritage”.

Jelena Stojiljković received a degree in Serbian language and literature from the University of Belgrade, Serbia. She has worked as professor of Serbian language and literature in elementary and high schools. She has been actively involved in developing integrative methods in education through the art of drama, since 2009. She created an original approach to integrating professional curricula of a program for drama education for teachers. She participated in the EU project DICE-Drama improves Lisbon Key Competences in Education. She participated in national and international conferences and research project in drama in education, students’ talents, vocational school with the literature through dramatic techniques. She is co-author of “Serbiana” on teachers’ creative competencies. She is a founder of a school theatre “Theater Farmakopea” and an author of several texts on the educational methods using drama in shaping the students’ integrated knowledge. She has received a number of awards and acknowledgments for the work in language and drama in education. In 2016, she became an official educational consultant, and since 2018 she is an active collaborator of the Institute for the Improvement of Education, Center for program development and textbooks of the Department of Education of Republic of Serbia.

Aleksandra Jelić is a film and theatre director. She is the author of several award-winning documentaries, theatre performances, music videos and commercials. She is also founder of ApsArt Centre for Theatre Research. Over the past twelve years her professional engagement has been mainly focused on applied theatre. She has worked with children with learning disabilities, victims of family violence, Roma people, prisoners, children with cancer, drug addicts, psychiatric patients, youth in detention and other socially marginalized groups. She worked for six years in Serbian maximum-security prisons and has been pioneer in the field of prison art in Serbia. In 2009, ApsArt won the ERSTE Award for Social Integration. In 2011, in Novi Beograd she founded the first Community Theatre in Serbia, creative center for socially active citizens devoted to spreading applied theatre practice, advocacy for right on arts and education.