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IATL Strategic Grant

Emma Parfitt — Tue, 02 Feb 2016 22:00:00 +0000

I have been awarded a grant for a project with the Belgrade Theatre, Coventry to begin on completion of my doctorate. This is a highly competative staff fund, for large-scale projects which support the university’s teaching and learning strategy. I obtained this grant with the support of Cath Lambert.

The title of the project is:

A retrospective study to ascertain the pedagogic benefits of research-led teaching

‘Bearing witness to marginalised groups’

My research interest

The Belgrade Theatre’s ‘bearing witness to marginalised groups’ programme aims to work with young people from diverse backgrounds. Each group works closely with a trained dramaturge (a crafter of stories for the stage), sharing and shaping experiences into dramatic form. This offers young people an opportunity to reflect, share, rethink, and transform their stories. As post-war Coventry was rebuilt so was a theatre for the community (the Belgrade). The Council Statute stated that the theatre was obliged to build links between drama and young people. 50 years later, the Belgrade has continued to work with groups of young people, from primary to secondary school age, in the theatre, in the community, and in schools in Coventry. The theatre’s 14 regular groups meet weekly during term-time, and in addition there are holiday camps and summer schools. Our project is a retrospective study with previous participants of the ‘bearing witness’ programme.

From IATL’s perspective

This project is an exciting opportunity to assess Warwick undergraduates through a research-led teaching experience. I therefore proposed that the study would hire two undergraduates to receive paid research experience and training to improve their employability. The students’ progress will be supported and assessed by the research assistant throughout the study in order to inform the aims and objectives of a research-led teaching module.

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Rise up @ the Belgrade Theatre (Coventry)

Emma Parfitt — Sat, 24 Oct 2015 13:05:00 +0000

The show got me during its final moments when the young people on the stage said to the audience ‘you have a choice.’ I was enjoying four young people’s portrayal freedom riders in the US; riding the buses to protest against segregation. Part of me, however, wanted to hear another story: that of British segregation. It wasn’t taught to me at school and still appears not to be. I only know it exists because of narrated life stories. It’s a bit like the feeling I get when Black History Month comes around… my first question is always why? Not in the sense that it is a bad idea, but growing up in a multi-cultural society and having friends from a diverse range of countries and backgrounds, out with and inside the UK, I want to know why our History curriculum is not reflective of our society.

The play reminded me of Mr Maxwell, the teacher with the cheeky opinions who pushed the boundaries of history. He asked the big questions. We got inside the poems of Maya Angelou and the conditions of the slave ships and asked why it happened in the first place. Mr Maxwell challenged us to see that history, the history in the class text, was one version amongst many. History was remembered how it was written.

Plays like Rise Up give me hope because they open up dialogue for people to speak, listen, and reflect. Not necessarily in the theatre but retelling the aspects of the play they connected with to other things and ask those big questions such as ‘why isn’t our history curriculum reflective of our diverse social background as a country?’ Hoping that someone better positioned than I hears this message and challenges the curriculum to change. At the heart of all theatre is the hope of social change.

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PhD Agony

Emma Parfitt — Mon, 27 Apr 2015 08:16:00 +0000

(based on the genius song “Agony” from Into the Woods by Stephen Sondheim)

Did I abuse this (educational opportunity)
by showing distain?
My brain’s feeling mashed up.
I might just lose it;
tormented I’m reeling
from frontal lobe pain!

Agony!
VIVA’s out of my reach
When you’ve had an idea
Yet that idea it still defies speech

Alone at my desk
I sit by the hour
Tearing my hair
Tense and confused, frequently screaming
A song of despair
Ah-ah-ah-ah-ah-ah-ah-

Agony!

Caught my tongue in a draw
Trying to write is like trying
To fight Je Suis Charlie, and more

Agony!

Oh, the fees that they charge!

If I had funding…

If I had funding I’d

buy butter not marg.

I’m not grammatically
savy,
fanatical,
charming,
attentive,
gifted,
as bright as the person

I’m trying to be

You are everything government bodies

could wish for.

Then why don’t

they fund you?

I really don’t know!

Professors know nothing of sadness
They have jobs and there aren’t
aren’t any jobs, as you’re
nearing the ending
you’re deadline approaching
Ah-ah-ah-ah-ah-ah-ah-ah-

Agony!

Unemployment!

Debt!

My life’s far from a peach

If the rich had a heart

I would eat it for tea

Agony!

That can sting like a lemon!

I will survive my PhD

(hopefully)

[please note that this is a satire of the PhD experience, based on my own experiences and those of others… not to be taken seriously… hopefully]

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Writing for Performance 17th January 2013

Emma Parfitt — Sun, 27 Jan 2013 13:31:00 +0000

An interdisciplinary discussion of the different way people go about doing collaborative theatre work. Talkers on the panel included Omar Elerian, Associate Director of the Bush Theatre,West London, Michael Bywater, and playwright James Wilson.

Inua Ellams, who wrote 13 Fairy Negro Tales, started off the evening by performing one of his fabulous poems.

The discussion was about finding form, a works shape, in order to tell stories in the theatre. As one person shared with the group, this can be a fine act, ‘Covered in honey wearing moustaches singing the blues, but it all made sense at the time.’ And surprisingly to the audience too! Sounds brilliant, wish I’d seen it.

Sometimes in modern theatre the ideas that you are working with can be very fragmented especially in collaborations when people have different point of view. Theatre is an organic discourse with the audience. The work, Omar Elerian said, isn’t truly finished until the final curtain falls. Different audiences have an effect on the acting of the play. And so too in my reading of storytelling performance I am discovering that the audience and storyteller influence one another by visual clues.

Anyone interested in collaborative work should check out Radiolab as suggested by Inua Ellams. Thanks!

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