Applied Theatre Research - Chinese and Norwegian Perspectives on Drama and Applied Theatre, Dec 2022

Based on the authors’ previous academic exchange and observations, translation of terms related to drama and theatre from English to Chinese and vice versa is likely to cause misunderstandings. This research investigated what the translation of key terms may reveal about the understandings of drama education in China. Through a desk research, we collected key terms primarily related to drama and theatre from 26 seminal English and Norwegian books in the field of drama education and their Chinese translations, sorting out and comparing the English/Norwegian originals and the Chinese translations of each term. Findings confirmed that the same Chinese expressions had been used for completely different drama-related terms, while applied theatre-related terms may be misleading as the translation may refer to theatre architectures. Elaborating on the understanding of drama and theatre in China and the new drama praxis, the Drama Etudes, this study discusses what the term ‘drama education’ may refer to in the Chinese context. The overall aim of this study is to contribute to an extended understanding of drama education and its relevant praxis in a global context.

The article presents and discusses etymological background, cultural adaptations and different perspectives to the key concepts in drama and theatre, starting from western and Chinese conceptions. Drama has at least three levels of meaning: (1) as an overarching concept for fictional and non-fictional cultural practices; (2) as an aesthetic learning practice within education; and (3) as a script made for theatre performances. The drama is thus a frame for the actions, and within this frame there might be other frames, marking different roles and perspectives. The meaning and potential for knowing in drama and theatre lie between those layers and differences. This idea is illustrated by a comparison between the British pioneers and partners Dorothy Heathcote and Gavin Bolton, and by exploring how divergent views on theatre and art lead to differences in perspective about a specific approach to educational drama, mantle of the expert.

The article is conceived as a survey exploration of significant historic developmental stages of the Norwegian educational drama field. The article first engages in an historical consideration of educational dramatics from traces of performed education in old Norse culture, via school drama organized by the church in the Middle Ages, to a decline of drama and theatre after Pietism in the eighteenth century, with a succeeding narrower view of knowledge and teaching in the following century and scarce information about drama as education. The focus then turns to deliberation of educational reforms in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, offering new possibilities for drama pedagogy through the Progressive Education movement, followed by identifying the position of drama in the six national curriculum reforms from 1939 to 2020 and the changing role of the subject area resulting from policy accentuations underlying curriculum revisions.

In this practice-oriented article, each author has found an example in their national contemporary literary legacy to be explored through educational drama approaches. One is a short story (and a one-act play version of the story) by Lao She, China; the other is a short story by Tor Åge Bringsværd, Norway. Both stories are about experiences on train journeys and the article presents ideas for how to use them in drama pedagogical settings. Each author contextualizes their drama approach in terms of current public curriculum policies relevant to aesthetic education and drama education in each country, and theory from the field literature.

With the introduction of drama in education and creative drama in China in the late twentieth century, drama in education has become a new practice and research hotspot in the field of education. However, children’s theatre performance and dramatic acting training have for a long time been the main form of Chinese preschool drama education and still have a noticeable impact. In this article, we explore how drama in education can improve and expand Chinese kindergarten teachers’ teaching repertoire and how it can contribute to children’s interpersonal development. This design-based study uses interventions in the form of drama in education workshops in a Chinese kindergarten. By undertaking these workshops, observing workshop participants and interviewing teachers and children, we have found that drama in education supports children’s language learning and helps develop their individual self-awareness. In addition, it also provides multiple new methods of teaching and thus promotes teachers’ individual growth as professionals in the kindergarten classroom. In terms of kindergarten curriculum reform, this study aims to contribute to the current developments and debates about teaching, learning and overall education.