Dear SCENARIO Readers,
This 20th SCENARIO issue marks a full decade of commitment to paving the way towards a performative teaching and learning culture. We will celebrate the 10th anniversary at our conference Performative Spaces in Language, Literature and Culture Education in May 2017 (University College Cork, May 25-28).
This issue starts off with our rubric Texts around Theatre, in which we present an excerpt from the autobiographical novel To the Theatre by Lili Grün. The focus is on a young woman whose dream to become an actress has become true, and a theatre engagement in the province seems to be the long-awaited chance for her debut. The excerpt from Grün’s novel, first published in 1935, traces the young woman’s first steps on the stage that means the world to her.
The issue contains four main articles:
Richard Bale (Brunel University, London, UK) focuses on the aspect of interpreter education. In his article entitled Online to On Stage: Towards a performative approach to interpreter education he proposes that a renewed focus on the interpreter as a language user and as a performer is necessary.
Alba Bordetas (University of Toulouse – Jean Jaurès, France) discusses aural-visual comprehension from the perspective of the semiotics of theatre. Developing aural-visual comprehension in a foreign language by filmed theatre demonstrates how filmed theatre has proved to be an innovative and motivating learning tool in the teaching of Spanish as a Foreign Language.
The following two articles focus on EFL teaching in Japan.
Matthew Michaud (University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada) & Todd Hooper (Setsunan University, Osaka, Japan) present an English as a foreign language (EFL) drama in language acquisition scriptwriting project. Their article Cultivating student understanding of context through drama and scriptwriting highlights that participating in scriptwriting activities may improve Japanese students’ ability to identify the context of English language conversations.
In Enhancing EFL learning in college through performance festivals – a holistic approach, Yasuko Shiozawa (Bunkyo University, Japan) & Miho Moody (Nagoya University, Japan) refer to a 20 year-old tradition of organising performance festivals and point out the learning benefits for Japanese EFL learners who actively participated in these festivals.
The German professional association Bundesarbeitsgemeinschaft (BAG) Spiel & Theater e.V. aims to develop an international glossary of key terms in the area of Performative Arts and Pedagogy and has invited professionals from outside Germany to become involved in this project. When on November 13th 2016 the 4th SCENARIO FORUM SYMPOSIUM took place at University College Cork professionals who are based at universities in English-speaking countries (Canada, United Kingdom, Ireland) participated in a Group Discussion which aimed to to explore the challenges of intercultural discourse in the area of Performative Arts and Pedagogy. We are pleased to present a transcription of the discussion in this issue.
It also features a text in our rubric Student Voices. Based on observations recorded in a personal course journal written while he was enrolled in the course College German Teaching at Indiana University during the Fall of 2016, Ben Swakopf (Indiana University, Bloomington, USA) observes that drama forces students outside of themselves while allowing them to hide behind fantastical roles. Creating more dangerous safe-spaces: A performative remedy for classroom solipsists? argues that forms of performative pedagogy can create a classroom atmosphere that is actually safer – and more vibrant – than before.
We are happy to introduce our new rubric Country Report which is linked to the SCENARIO Correspondents Initiative. Colleagues from different countries act as “SCENARIO Correspondents” and introduce SCENARIO readers to the performative arts infrastructure and historical and current developments in the area of performative pedagogy in their country. In this issue, Dagmar Höfferer (Bundesarbeitsgemeinschaft Theater in der Schule/IDEA Austria, Vienna) focuses on AUSTRIA and Amir Hossein Esmkhani (Iranzamin Language School, Zanjan, Iran) on the developments in IRAN.
This issue also contains three book reviews: Micha Fleiner’s (2016) Performative Künste im Hochschulstudium by Sandrine Eschenauer (Université Paris-Est, France), Alan Ayckbourn’s Theaterhandwerk. 101 selbstverständliche Regeln für das Schreiben und Inszenieren by Nina Hasenzagl (Pädagogische Hochschule Wien/Krems, Austria), and Claudia Agnes Müller’s Forschendes Theater. Chancen und Potential im Kontext von Spracherwerb, transkultureller Landeskunde und studentischer Performance (2015) by Anne Steiner (University of Education, Freiburg, Germany).
We conclude with a report by Stefanie Giebert (University of Reutlingen, Germany) & Eva Göksel (Pädagogische Hochschule Zug, Switzerland) on the Drama in Education Days 2016 conference in Reutlingen.
We wish all our readers health, happiness and lots of creative energy in the New Year 2017,
The Editors
Manfred Schewe & Susanne Even
Cork and Bloomington – January 2017