Theatre in prison: theory and practiceMichael Balfour [ed.]
Call number: 365.66 THE
From role-plays with street gangs in the USA to Beckett in Brixton; from opera productions with sex offenders to psychodrama with psychopaths, this book discusses, analyses and reflects on theoretical notions and practical applications of theatre for and with the incarcerated.
Theatre in Prison is a collection of 13 international essays exploring the rich diversity of innovative drama works in prisons. The book includes an introduction that presents a contextualisation of the prison theatre field. Thereafter, leading practitioners and academics explore key aspects of practice - prolemistising, theorising and describing specific approaches to working with offenders. The book also includes extracts from prison plays, poetry and prisoners writings that offer illustrations and insights into the experience of prison life.
Acting for real: drama therapy process, technique, and performance
Renee Emunah
Call number: 616.891523 EMU
This volume, written by a leading pioneer in the field, provides and integrative framework for the practice of drama therapy. The book offers a comprehensive and systematised description of techniques and in-depth analysis, supported by clinical examples and case histories, of the progression of brief and long-term drama therapy.
After exploring the primary conceptual sources at the roots of drama therapy, Renee Emunah delineates five developmental phases in the therapeutic process that will help the therapist pace treatment, assess progress, and choose effective techniques and interventions. The volume describes over 125 distinct drama therapy techniques, categorised according to phases of the session and treatment series and subcategorised by therapeutic objective. Performance-oriented drama therapy and "self-revelatory" theatre are also included.
Interactive and improvisational drama: varieties of applied theatre and performance
Adam Blatner with Daniel J. Wiener [ed.]
Call number: 792.071 INT
32 innovators share their approaches to interactive and improvisational drama, applied theatre, and performance, for education, therapy, recreation, community-building, and personal empowerment. This book covers the full range of dynamic methods that expand the theatre arts into new settings. There are approaches that don't require memorising scripts or mounting expensive productions. Dramatic engagement should be recognised as addressing a far broader purpose. There are ways that are playful, and types of non-scripted drama in which the audience become co-actors.
The couch and the stage: integrating words and action in psychotherapy
Robert J. Landy
Call number: 616.891523 LAN
This book explores the therapeutic effects of dramatic action. It details the psychoanalysts and action psychotherapists who conceived of the continuity of mind and body, words and action, challenging Freud's purely verbal and rational route to the unconscious. The book encourages mental health professionals to harness the knowledge of the dramatic therapies and contemporary neuroscience in the service of facilitating integration among discrepant parts of the self, the family and the group.
Drama and the adolescent journey: warm-ups and activities to address teen issues
Linda Nelson and Lanell Finneran
Call number: 616.8915230835 NEL
This book allows the discovery of variety of drama activities that start students on a journey toward greater self-esteem and maturity. Teens will learn to situate their experience within their own lives and within the world at large. With a strong research base beneath them, the authors demonstrate both why and how drama can help students enjoy their journey, showing them ways around the roadblocks they may meet and offering them a sense of how far they've come and where they'd like to be going. In addition, the authors offer crucial strategies for success with:
- understanding the developmental and behavioral changes of adolescence
- selecting content that truly engages adolescents and addresses their needs
- structuring drama activities to give teens the best possible support
- managing the activities and attending to the practical concerns of teaching with drama
Drama games: techniques for self-development
Tian Dayton
Call number: 158.1 DAY
Experiential therapy is used to locate repressed feelings and re-experience them. Once we feel them in the present, we can come to terms with them and put them in their proper perspective. We can use our energies to truly enter into the moment with all of our awareness. The quality of our happiness lies in our ability to experience what is around us. Feelings are often attached to rules. When we experiment with different roles we gain information about our personal history and play with new possibilities for change. Games help us to increase concentration, develop thinking skills and to coordinate thought, emotion and action. They are a way to allow humour and fun to enter into the therapeutic process.
This book is designed to help participants get in touch with and express buried feelings in a safe and structured way and to offer training in the ability to be creative and spontaneous.
New essays in drama therapy: unfinished business
Robert J. Landy
Call number: 616.891523 LAN
Robert Landy examines the possibilities of letting go and the notion that by doing so, individuals can move closer to an effective closure. Throughout this book, the assumption is held that an effective closure will come as individuals attempt to complete their unfinished business, which the author defines as the many unresolved, uncomfortable moments that are avoided or denied, that spring from uneasy intimacies and unsatisfactory attachments, from the failure to speak one's mind, to assert one's will, and to acknowledge and correct a real or imagined wrong. This volume attempts to lay more of the groundwork of drama therapy within a consistent framework of theory and practice. Rather than an anthology of many voices, it offers a single voice intoned in many keys.
This book focuses upon theory and practice, moving into new territory by addressing issues of assessment, supervision and termination. Notable in this volume is attention to cultural and spiritual issues, the former represented by an essay concerning the author's dialogue with Chinese culture in Taiwan. Throughout the book, Landy plays with some of the intricacies of his three-part model of role, counter-role and guide. To complete unfinished business, the author suggests that individuals need to invoke imagery rich enough in paradox and work with it as long as it takes to integrate role and counter-role by means of an effective guide.
