TfD Question from Stephen Metcalf …posted 14/01/08
Hi Cont,
Currently I am doing a lot of reading about community theatre/popular
theatre (a bit late, perhaps--I
have learned quite a lot through this reading about the potential of participatory theatre). Ross Kidd,
Zakes Mda, Penina Mlama, Richard Boon and Jane Plastow (and co.) are all
interesting, and maybe collectively
cover the theoretical issues. Interestingly, there is little published since
the early-mid 1990s, Which leads me to wonder if the early (1980s) enthusiasm for community
Theatre in Africa died due to lack
of funding, ineffectiveness, or implicit
threats to the status quo.
Can you give me an impression of the status of
popular theatre/community
theatre in Zimbabwe
these days? Have you had training in community
theatre/discussion theatre? Is it possible for groups like Tamuka to
learn the methodology these
days in Zim, or is this seen as too politically challenging? Is ZACT (Zim association for community theatre) still
active?
All the best,
Steve
Response:
Theater For Development (TfD)
Steve, to answer your questions I will give my opinion
on TfD as I teach it to my students here at Amakhosi. For the purposes of your study I will not directly answer each of your
questions separately but hope that in the process of discussing my experiences, observations and opinions your questions will
be covered. Remember my opinions are debatable.
When I started Amakhosi in 1980 Theater For Development
was already a growing Product and Process across the world, more so in Sub Saharan Africa which is the heart of Amakhosi.
The countries were fondly referred to those years as ‘Developing Countries’ (as if there are countries in the
world that ever stop developing) or ‘Third World Countries’ (as if the earth has more than one Sun shining on
it) TfD caught my attention and I fell in love with the Process
I how ever discovered or realized that it
was a directionless evolving process although its objective was very clear ….to become a development communication tool
for and by the communities…..Looking at its history and listening to its pioneers and observing where it was in its
development as a theater form, method and tool in the 80s I noticed that there where no clear progression stages that would
guide TfD to its final destination from Experimental Labs to the Communities that need to USE it. Zero direction. This was
not the only challenge that faced TfD. The other serious one was that it lacked documentation capacity of its own development
that would be available in the Communities themselves. Zero methodology documentation at Community level.
This is where I felt I could contribute by taking
further the TfD work that the great pioneers had initiated. I started by defining my own stages for Theater for Development
from Experimental Labs to Communities. The first crucial question to ask was ..how would we tell when TfD had finally arrived
at Communities?
I said this is the stage when Communities embrace
TfD methodologies as part of a permanent community development communication processes that exist among them and begin to
create communication traditions that start to be passed on from generation to generation within that community just like computers,
cell phones, radios, books, story telling songs and so on and that gradually become part of many communities influencing behavior
change. This is a stage where TfD will not be brought by scholars, academics, theater practitioners, government and non governmental
development agencies to communities but would be found existing in the Communities as part of that community, being used by
that community and evolving to new levels driven by political and economic changes taking place within that particular community.
I can safely say in Zimbabwe, as I don’t know in other countries that there is no Community with
TfD existing at the stage at which I have referred to above. In my opinion there is a long way in developing TfD from the
Experimental Labs to Communities.
I developed the following STAGES to guide my contribution
so that it’s clear for those who may want to contribute in the future and take TfD closer to the Communities that need
it to develop themselves from where I too could have left off.
STAGE ONE:
I call this the Formative Stage. This is the stage
when theater practices begin to depart from the Aristotelian Drama with a journey towards Communities. Pioneers at this stage
that come to mind are the likes of Brecht, Freire, Boal, Garcia and others. I always say to my students at Amakhosi that this
generation, at this stage developed …..some of the hundreds of dramatic theater Techniques…Exercises….Games…and
Strategies that are mostly found in many different TfD presentations across Continents from their Labs, Groups and Departments.
STAGE TWO:
I call this the Application Stage. This is the stage
when most of the dramatic techniques, exercises, games and strategies developed and sharpened in Stage One are taken to communities
at scaled up efforts and I think starting from Southern Africa. Pioneers that come to mind
at this stage are the likes of Kidd, Etherton, Kerr, Faruque and many others and they networked and collaborated with indigenous
theater workers in several countries Botswana, Zambia,
Malawi taking the lead in Southern Africa.
We see at this stage the growth and increase of international TfD seminars and workshops. Labs, groups and University departments
still dominated as the vehicle frame work of TfD. This posed an obvious challenge for the development of TfD. If a TfD Champion
moved job, university or country they moved with all the motivation and the TfD fire died out first at the University, then
at the experimental communities and finally the whole country. Another some what funny and strange set up, at this stage is
that University departments tended to be comfortable to use Adult Literacy Education organizations and institutions as the
frame work for trying out the application of TfD and not indigenous professional Theater Institutions. What was overlooked
by the TfD champions is that Adult Literacy Education organizations and institutions did not have Theater as their core business
and would not sustain the continuous development of the TfD process and practice for long.
One other development that took shape at this stage
is the off shoot and further streamlining of TfD according to where it is being applied and why. You then got identifying
terms such as Theater In Education TIE, Community Theater, Forum Theater, Edutainment and so on. I have always said to my
students at Amakhosi that the difference here is the same except for where the application takes place.
STAGE THREE:
I call this the Institutionalization Stage. In my
opinion because of lack of direction, goal or destination for the TfD process and practice, this caused I think by the excitement
of the success of stage two, this is where the TfD champions messed up the development of the process or should I say the
journey of TfD to its destination, the Community. May be it was not their intention to take it to communities; they had other
intentions. But for me it is like any product. If you are going to develop a new product, a tool at the engineering lab you
want that product to end up with the communities of the world where it becomes part of their lives until some one else or
yourself comes up with a better product. Constructing a nice freeway or road to the river when you have no idea on how you
will construct a bridge at the ever flowing crocodile and hippo infested river is not a clever way to contributing to developing
the community across the river!
The local indigenous theater institutions at this
stage embrace TfD mainly the local Training, Implementation, Supervision, Monitoring, Documentation and Networking components
of TfD focusing on targeted specific Communities in selected districts and provinces.
It is at this stage that governmental and
none governmental development agencies working with various development and education programs at District and Village level
partner with the local theater institution to support each others objectives. The Social Partner organization brings in funding
and issue expertise while the Theater Institution brings in the TfD process.
I am afraid this Stage remains virgin in the development
of TfD and its collaboration with Development Agencies.
STAGE FOUR:
I call this the Networking Development Stage. This
is the stage that focuses on developing local, regional and international TfD networks. This stage feeds back to Stage One
and down all other stages. This is the Stage too where TfD Festivals develop. I have only heard of one such a TfD festival
from a friend of mine, actor Isaka from Bekina Faso.
According to my TfD development stages I observe
that the TfD champions jumped stage Three and went straight to Stage Four creating national associations of theater and international
associations of theater based on individual collaborations, experiments and local community drama groups and not based on
Indigenous Theater Institutions that have physical space and can guarantee local continuity of the development TfD.
Like expatriates and academics drama groups die
as group members move on. This will affect local associations as these have been built on groups while the dearth of local
associations affects connections and linkages to international associations.
You will note that the early years of the TfD initiatives
were championed by Expatriates who passed the baton stick to indigenous academics most of whom they had met through the University
and these indigenous academics passed the baton sticks to groups and associations skipping local indigenous theater institutions.
The associations and groups soon found themselves with no local theater institutions to give them continuous support and most
of them folded up.
In my observations this challenge is not faced only
by TfD but generally by most community development projects and initiatives.
International Donors and Foundations give funds
to Universities, who in turn send Expatriate academics to local Universities who come and run experiments in Communities for
the funding period. Towards the last year of funding they pass the project to local academics or individuals that they trust
who in turn finish up the funding and dump the Community and follow the Expatriate academic to join their overseas University
and follow their individual dreams. End of the development project.
This works the same way even if the International
Donors give funds to local NGOs who appoint their staff and academic consultants, mostly floating consultants with the funds
normally accompanied by; strange enough a non floating consultant or expatriate.
Towards the end of the funding time frame the local NGO dumps the Community and moves to another community with a different
project and different donor. Same dead end to the community project.
This funding and development model in my opinion
affected TfD greatly when it jumped to Stage Four omitting the development and capacity building of Stage Three.
It is how ever true that most countries did not
have strong indigenous theater institutions as the development of these got overshadowed by colonial theaters. It was easier
to then develop groups and associations. I how ever feel the University departments should have taken time and made efforts
to create were possible and build capacity to local indigenous theater institutions the same way missionaries created schools,
hospitals and churches which became permanent local community development institutions when they arrived in our communities
rather than opt for an easy quick way out.
STAGE FIVE:
This is what I call the Community Level Stage. This
is the destination of TfD. In my opinion for the past Three or Four decades TfD has been in and out of communities on experimental
bases only and has failed to arrive to stay.
This is because of mainly two challenges that TfD
found its self facing every time it arrived to stay at the Community. These are Political and Economic challenges. It looks
like TfD should deal with these two challenges before it can find a permanent home in Communities.
TfD Champions mixed and messed up Stages Four
and Five while completely skipping Sage Three in my TfD development blocks. Even the study of TfD at many Universities today
I consider just the pile up study of the out puts of Stage One and Two and the study of failures of Stage Four. It is no where
near the study of TfD practice, processes, methodology and its own development processes as this in my opinion has totally
failed to get to communities in the past four decades. How ever each Stage has had very successful experiments that are worth
studying. It is these successes that several academics have written on country specific. A few that come to mind are the likes
of Penina, Jane Plastow (the same Jane we have been in contact with over the past week), Harding, Dale, I think wrote stuff
on Zimbabwe if my memory serves me right, Mda, and many others.
AMAKHOSI
My TfD focus through the work that I do with Amakhosi
is still largely on Stage Three. This is the most challenging of stages given that one has to focus on building institutional
capacity and face the political and economic challenges of bringing TfD permanently to Communities.
TfD work inspired me to develop the Amakhosi model.
I call this model The Open Creative Space Model. I like calling it by its nickname ‘The Bus Stop Model’ The concept
is developed around the need to provide Space, Tools and Skills to any one from
the community who walks into Amakhosi with a dream to create and communicate.
I have been assisting the rural Community
of Masendu in Bulilima District of Matabeleland South build such a model Center based on the Open Creative Space concept of
Amakhosi. I would recommend any one who would like to study what I mean when I say TfD should get to the Community permanently.
Masendu has all the lessons of what Communities equipped with TfD permanently can do with it. It is the only community driven
Rural Multi-Purpose Center
that I know of in Zimbabwe if not in Southern Africa
that was built buy the rural community its self, run it and lead their community projects through cultural development led
by their local traditional leaders and Chief.
In the African continent I consider the work of
both Ngugis in Kenya with Kamirithu as
belonging to Stage Three and an example of the University taking the development of TfD to the next correct stage. They could
how ever not negotiate and survive through the political challenges that are the test of walking past this stage to Stage
Four. How ever when Ngugi moved to Zimbabwe
he moved his TfD activities to Stage Four right away and focused on developing ZACT an association which has since closed
down for the reasons mainly of jumping to Stage Four before building a solid Stage Three.
TfD faces political challenges because in most communities
in Africa if you give confidence and capacity to any one to stand up and speak loud in public about issues concerning their
development they will start or end with …democracy, human rights, governance, oppression and exploitation issues one
way or another. This will of course lead to logger heads between politicians and administrators of the TfD program. This is
precisely why Amakhosi and I face serious political challenges currently with my work.
Let me conclude by saying that there is need
to pick up the energy in bringing TfD to communities across the world. I think that it has a role to play as the political
challenges of the world will soon give way in the next 50 years or so to serious world emerging crises and challenges of …..fast
growing children and young adults alienation…natural environment ….global warming… all issues that will
require Community driven social action to fully address.
Steve let me end by saying that one of the weaknesses
of TfD is in Audio Visual documentation of methodology, practice and processes. So please do us a favor; all those audio visual
tapes we sent you for your study, please burn them on DVDs and send them back to us for our archives.
Feel free to email more questions. I will
post this response to our Community Theater section on the Amakhosi website for the purposes of others that might be studying
or writing about TfD.
Cont Mhlanga
Amakhosi
Monday, January 14, 2008
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BREAKING NEW GROUND
Kids
who live in the Street present their first Theater Performance –posted 02/11/07
After
two months of thorough acting workshops street kids have finally staged their first performance in life. They acted at a function
that was organized for HIV infected children that are on ARVs at Mpilo Opportunistic Infections Unit. The main organizers
of this function were the Amakhosi Director Cont Mhlanga and Bulawayo artist and business woman Sarah Mpofu.The street kids
staged a piece that was a reflection of their lives .One might wonder why street kids had to go and tell stories about their
lives at such a function. The main purpose of their performance was to expose the kids to the world of art and also to teach
them to be responsible in life since they were paid for the performance after the show like professionals. I even feel bad
now for calling these kids streets kids because they are now fulltime artists with a stage name(Young Blood) for that matter.
When
this project was initiated these kids used to receive food and clothing from us but this time around we have decided to take
their responsibility levels a bit higher. They work for them to get what they desire in life, they have to discard their dependency
syndrome that they developed in the streets. Besides performing the kids do piece jobs during weekends for them to meet their
daily needs like any other independent human being. To add on their career options the kids are also now doing workshops on
how to play music instruments. They are now kept busy throughout the whole week since they do theatre workshops on Mondays,
Wednesdays and Fridays and music workshops on Tuesdays and Thursdays .On a different note Young Blood is making thorough preparations
on the play that they will perform on November 19, 2007 at Amakhosi in front of a much bigger audience. The play that they
are working on will work as Forum theatre since we are planning to invite people from different governmental and non governmental
institutions that look after kids for a short discussion concerning children around Zimbabwe. After the discussion we are intending to get strategies on how to reduce
the cases of children leaving home to the streets and how best to look after or rehabilitate those that are staying in institutions.
Living
in a Box kids project is set to reach greater heights but our main challenge at the moment is funding. A homely atmosphere
has to be created were these kids live and as a result money is needed to make that possible. The kids need furniture like
television sets, playstations and computers to refresh and broaden their minds. Such kind of furniture will not only entertain
and educate them but it will bar them from not going back to the streets were they are socially deconstructed. After their
performance on the 19th of November, 2007 the kids are set to tour various theatre houses and institutions that
house disadvantaged children and for this to be made possible they need funds again. We therefore appeal to well-wishers and
the cooperate world for financial assistance for these emerging artists to make their dreams come true.
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AMAKHOSI TALKS GENDER
By Sihle Nyathi ..... posted 13/12 06
As Amakhosi continues to make headway in the fight for the improvement
of society through the arts, Amakhosi will in January initiate a project in Bubi/ Umguza district to address the gender imbalances
through the programme called music for community action ( MCA).
The aims of the project are to promote gender awareness and create an enabling environment for rural women to realize
their full potential and command control of their destiny in the face of HIV/ AIDS. This will be achieved through the use
of music and dialogue in the community on gender and HIV/AIDS issues.
The project coordinator, Dennis Ncube said that the project has been initiated because Zimbabwean rural women continue
to occupy a low status in society and it is exacerbated by the fact that they carry disproportionate burdens of life and they
are denied benefits of choice in economical and social spheres.
“ We hope the project can make the rural women realize that they do have choices and they have the potential
to influence their future. Rural women can be emancipated from the burden of societal traditions and culture which has condemned
them to early marriages, HIV infection and unwanted pregnancies”, said Ncube.
Ncube noted that despite the gloomy picture some successes have been noted because of the advocacy that has been initiated
by various organizations. ‘It is sad that it is only the urban women that are finding their footing and measuring up
to the opposite sex. The urban women are in control of their sexuality and are able to negotiate safe sex thus minimizing
the risk associated with HIV infection”, said Mr. Ncube.
Mr. Ncube is of the view that Zimbabwean women’s subordination remains real and gender related issues are not
talked about. He noted that the present pressing economical situation prevailing in the country has worsened the situation
as the men are working out of the country and this increases the risk of infecting their wives because they co-habit when
they are out of the country.
Amakhosi will hold gender training workshops for selected participants so as to make them aware of the conditions that
they are living in. The workshops will also identify the obstacles to gender equality and come up with ways of overcoming
them.Amakhosi will also train the selected women in music and the women will compose songs that will advocate for gender equality
and present performances and discussion forums across their own district.
Amakhosi’s Social Partner in this initiative the Canadian CIDA has invested close to 89 000 thousand Canadian
dollars in support of this 12 months Arts for Social Change Program. This is the second time for CIDA to partner with Amakhosi’s
rural outreach community initiatives as they did so some 4 years ago in Amakhosi’s Taking HIV/AIDS Advocacy to Scale
in Rural Areas of Matebeleland North Province. The program covered all the 7 districts of the Province.
This is not the first time that Amakhosi has initiated programmes that promote gender equality and notably among the
programmes is the television drama series called Stitsha which had the message that girls should be given a choice to decide
their own destiny.
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Amakhosi
Theater In The Global Mercury Project
