Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Enlightened Empathy: Applied Theatre Transforming Society And Self, Abi K. Johnson

Honors Projects and Presentations: Undergraduate

While working on this project, I struggled with what to actually call this category of theatre. Augusto Boal uses the term “theatre of the oppressed” to describe his model of theatre. Other theatre artists use terms like social justice theatre, grassroots theatre, political theatre, or popular participatory theatre. I decided that the best-fitting term was applied theatre, which is described by Prendergast & Saxton as a type of theatre that “works overtly either to reassert or to undermine socio-political norms, as its intent is to reveal more clearly the way the world is working” (Prendergast & Saxton, 2009, p. 8). …