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The chapter outlines a collaborative project between colleagues within a New Zealand teacher education program who have an ongoing commitment to work together and grapple with issues of cultural relevance and emergent leadership within their preservice teacher education program. Here the authors revisit the form, content and delivery of an undergraduate course in curriculum drama to consider how to engage Māori student teachers, be culturally relevant, and yet challenge some preconceptions about drama as a learning area and a pedagogy. The chapter describes the conversations that took place, the strategies that were tried, the responses of students and teachers, and the shifts in understanding that were reported by those involved. Rather than offering any suggestion of objective “hard data,” this is a story told as honestly as possible, by participants in an exchange. It is a story, we suggest, of quiet nurturing (poipoia – supporting in growth) and unfolding (kia pūāwai – blossoming and unfolding) and the fostering of leadership at various levels.

Case study research frequently includes collecting and interpreting stories individuals tell about their lives and event that they believe that they know about. Chapter 3 discusses storytelling theory and describes case study research in consumer behavior of stories that consumers tell about buying and using products and services. Storytelling is pervasive through life. Much information is stored, indexed, and retrieved in the form of stories. Although lectures tend to put people to sleep, stories move them to action. People relate to each other in terms of stories — and products and brands often play both central and peripheral roles in their stories. To aid storytelling research in consumer psychology, this chapter develops a narrative theory that describes how consumers use brands as props or anthropomorphic actors in stories they report about themselves and others. Such drama enactments enable these storytellers to experience powerful myths that reflect psychological archetypes. The chapter includes findings from case study research that probes propositions of the theory. Implications for consumer psychology and marketing practice follow the discussion of the findings.

This chapter explores ethical issues related to the use of drama-based methods in child and youth-focussed research projects. It begins by outlining some of the reasons for utilising drama-based research methods in projects that examine children’s perspectives and lived experiences. The chapter proceeds to discuss specific methods of drama-based inquiry including ethnodrama, ethnotheatre, reader’s theatre, play-building, devised theatre and collective creation. The sections draw on examples from recent drama-based research projects to highlight some of the key ethical considerations in drama-based research with children and young people, including specific issues surrounding representation, transparency, physical risks, power dynamics, consent, confidentiality, anonymity and reciprocity. The author shares her experiences of navigating some of the tricky ethical challenges involved in a recent participatory play-building project in Canada, providing some suggestions to help researchers in the field become better prepared to use and assess these methods and approaches in research with children and young people.

Purpose – I extend the discourse regarding The Days of Wine and Roses (TDoWaR) as an Alcoholics Anonymous (A.A.) film in particular and analyses of A.A. films in general and provide a symbolic interactionist reading of TDoWaR as involving compliance dramas.

Design/methodology/approach – Borrowing from Norman Denzin's notion of a subversive reading of films, in which the author attends to the literal content of a text from a predefined perspective, I deal with the characters as if they create and maintain aligned and congruent actions that authors can analyze as conversational and interactional content. My main interest, drawing upon symbolic interactionist conceptualization and previous reviews of TDoWaR, involves the decisions made by characters to imbibe against their better judgment.

Findings – I detected four dramas (foreshadowed, evocative, profane, and complementary) that differed in interactional intensity and consequences. Each involves mutual decision making associated with self-definition and definition of the relationships. I also locate the dramas in the context of moral themes of an A. A. Film, specifically an epiphany, a categorical commitment to sobriety, an ongoing life cycle of recovery, and synchronicity.

Originality/value – Compliance dramas involve decisions to engage in ordinary activity (in this case, drinking) that becomes nonordinary, owing to semiotic, situational, historical, and interactional dynamics. The chapter can encourage thinking about alcoholism and alcoholic films as involving a moral career of a recovering alcoholic that sometimes must involve sacrifice of other prestigious moral careers (e.g., of a romantic relationship) in order to maintain the authenticity of the identity.

New Mexico (NM) students live complex intersectional lives; thus, drama is a tool that grants students the keys to understanding social justice, resistance, and, most importantly, healing. For drama to be used as a social justice tool, elements of the outside world need to be brought into the classroom. The following uses Teatro Campesino as a radical educational framework that recenters the lost voices of NM students. The intersectional nature of NM students presents a unique opportunity for teachers where drama and Teatro Campesino thrive as its aides in dismantling the education system as a way to provide more equity in the classroom. The classroom space should celebrate and discuss all social locations and struggles. But the space has been hostile, and taboo subjects such as mental health and suicide are supposed to be left at the door, but this is not possible. Using drama, specifically as a learning tool and aspect of the classroom grants students the opportunity to learn more about themselves and others through a safe space. NM youth are susceptible to a lot, including, but not limited to historical trauma, high levels of stress, and a variety of commitments that extend well beyond the classroom. Because of these added aspects of student life, being a K–12 student in New Mexico is different from where the majority of the curriculum comes from. Thus, using Teatro Campesino and the musical Dear Evan Hansen is not only appropriate to bring into the classroom but also critical for equity to prevail.

The recent world refugee crisis has mobilized societies all around the globe and has led to the multiplication of initiatives calling for support to refugees. Given the fact that one-third of the displaced population were children, measures for their immediate integration into schools were taken in most European countries. Although in Greece children with refugee experience first attended schools in 2017, teachers were not adequately prepared to cope with students who had lacked schooling for many years and with whom they couldn’t easily communicate due to language barriers. New teaching methodologies were needed for pre- and in-service teachers to bridge the gap between existing knowledge and the needs of refugee students. In this context, the authors designed a project called “Literacy through Drama” in the reception class of a public school in Volos, Greece involving 12 pre-service teachers. The findings of the study highlight that drama-based informal learning may provide opportunities for pre-service teachers to develop valuable knowledge about learners in authentic settings and pedagogy in practice. Faculties of education could facilitate effective community partnerships with organizations that work with refugee families and children and the school system and propose holistic curricula which include refugee student experiences. Moreover, pre-service teachers could gain skills and knowledge in supporting refugee students, identify refugee students’ needs, communicate in creative ways, and overcome deficit beliefs about refugee students.

Purpose: Drawing on research in crime and media studies, this research examines media images and stereotypes of criminals within the popular television crime drama series Bones. Methodology/approach: All 24 episodes of Season 9 were examined. Through a content analysis offender gender, race, age, offense type, and motive were examined. Findings: This research revealed that most of the images do not reflect the reality of crime and criminals. Gendered and racialized images were revealed. While male minorities’ victimization was more accurately portrayed, White females were cast in the stereotype as the emotional offender and minority females’ criminality was portrayed as similar to male criminals.

In this account of a study of a Theatre of the Oppressed (TO) intervention in a preservice teacher classroom, the authors explore an alternative way of learning to teach, as well as the dynamics of interdisciplinary collaboration between Theater and Education. Measures of racial and political attitudes did not demonstrate any change in the preservice teachers; however, several limitations made these findings inconclusive. Observations and journal entries suggested that interactive theater may be a promising way to make beliefs about teaching and learning visible, and therefore accessible for critical reflection.

Drama enactments by trainees (DETs) include verbal and contextual exchanges by two or more trainees in customer–server dramas usually in the presence of trainee observers and trainers. DETs' objectives include nurturing the conscious, decoding unconscious thinking and action, and informing learning of customer–server exchanges. Training in DETs provides an opportunity to practice which increases knowledge and skills necessary for performing customer–server exchanges accurately and achieving high customer satisfaction. This chapter is a case study report on an in-class drama enactment of a hotel guest and receptionist face-to-face encounter. The enactment includes face-to-face conversations between two actors and within selves.

This chapter explores an approach to instruction in pre-service classes called “goofiness pedagogy.” Embedded in teaching and learning theories, goofiness pedagogy is designed to model creative teaching to help emergent bilingual learners academically, linguistically, and socially. Currently in Arizona, highly restrictive language policies limit curricular and pedagogical choices for students acquiring English. As a result, pre-service teachers are often reluctant to work with them, and worried that their own creativity will be constrained. This chapter thus discusses a multi-year study of goofiness pedagogy – theatrical drama, play, and performance – that helps pre-service teachers develop an alternative vision of exceptional teaching for and with emergent bilingual learners. Data sources include student and author reflections on the practice of performed goofiness in Structured English Immersion classes at the University of Arizona, video-taped performances of students engaged in drama and improvisation, and analysis of student written artifacts. Findings indicate that while some pre-teachers hesitate to participate in “performed goofiness,” the majority believe that theatrical activities encourage them to try out innovative teaching strategies, take risks, make mistakes, and analyze those mistakes in a supportive community of practice. Equally important, pre-service teachers begin to understand that learning in general, and language learning in particular, are social pursuits and that teachers should create social spaces in their own classrooms to support the academic and language development of emergent bilingual students. Goofiness pedagogy also has transformed the author’s own teaching practices, and consequently represents a “pedagogy of hope” within a rigid state context.