re-imagining learning,
activism and justice
through suitably strange
creative practice
EMPATHEATREA unique interdisciplinary theatre methodology Empatheatre - brings together various forms of forum, documentary, verbatim, research and applied theatre models. Empatheatre is a situated, experiential and social learning process that uses theatre and storytelling to create new opportunities for conflict transformation and to transgress cultural, bureaucratic or stigmatic boundaries within society. |
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SMALL ACTSSmall actions create the practice-base learning we need to develop longer term projects. Small acts include a variety of suitably strange, uncanny experiments into warming up the cold, oppressive and normative realities we are faced with in the world today. |
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"...a social learning classroom for the ecological citizen does not resemble anything we are familiar with today, it is amorphous, uncanny and opportunistic, it lies both in the traditional outer realms between apprentice and mentor, but also in the inner realms of intuition, imagination and inner perceptivity" Dylan McGarry Empathy in the time of Ecological Apartheid |
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THE TERRITORY OF Uncanny justness recognises the importance of...
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the suitably strange
Making strange' is a vital part of uncanny justness. It involves engaging and encouraging participants to use their imaginations in new ways, in both familiar and unfamiliar contexts. Creating the space for the uncanny allows us to transform and play with the contexts, histories and cultural norms. Suitably strange work requires striking a balance between the familiar and the strange with care and compassion.
Noel Gough (2009: 74) described ‘defamiliarisation’ as ‘making the familiar strange, and the strange familiar’ in his rhizomatic curriculum inquiry. Gough (2009: 75) described the tactic of surprise as useful in diminishing distortions and helping us recognise our own preconceptions, a ‘learning-as-forgetting’ that enables the potential for new intellectual breakthrough. |
immersive empathy
To immerse yourself in another's experience is an act of acute attentiveness and creative imaginal thinking. It is a process of staying with the realities of what Timothy Morton calls "the strange stranger". Uncanny Justness is experiencing empathy as if you were Jonah swallowed by a transparent whale. You are within the experience of another, while maintaining your own 'justness' - your insight- of the world through the transparent being of the whale.
Immersive empathy works with the familiar and unusual that exists in our human and more than human experiences. As Joseph Beuys worked with "invisible materials" in his social sculpture work. Creating immersive empathy is an act of sculpting the invisible yet actively 'staying with' (an often times) misunderstood other.
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ethics of care & anger
Empathy alone is not a cure for social and ecological injustice. It is of course a powerful capacity in developing robust forms of solidarity and is an important sensibility in forging intersectional relationships. Transformation and justice work is oftentimes difficult, uncomfortable, painful, grief-laden and infuriating. While transformation seeks liberating, cathartic, and affirming forms of change, acknowledging the anger, frustration and pain of this work is vital. The ethical approach to uncanny justness goes beyond 'do no harm' approaches to ethical protocols but recognises the active and politically rigorous forms of care needed in transformations work. The ethics of anger recognises the importance of acknowledging and creating space for anger and frustration, and channeling anger as a mobilising and agency supporting process. Safe spaces to be angry are vital in affirming the 'justness' of people and their experiences.
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