Project 1: Awakening Awareness

Mallika Sarabhai analyses violence in India as of three kinds: against women or involving women; between groups in the same religion (e.g. families, tribes, castes); and between religions (all these also feature in Mallika's performance-piece V for, performed by her with Darpana/Pan Project from 1995).

This project aims to 'motivate the children' to think about existing problems and biases… through the medium of 'story-telling', and the focus is on three major areas, i.e. gender differences, communal disharmony and color complex. Members of the Darpana performance troupe form the project team. The stages in the project are as follows:

Each stage involves some small-group work including games, discussion, work on performance skill, encouragement and support for the process of creating something together.


Project 2: Jagruti

Here the issues are apparently somewhat more ‘external’ (though clearly Project I also addresses this perception): environmental and health issues such as water, garbage disposal and air/ energy. The programme starts with the presentation of a performance around the topic- often using characters and motifs from the Gujarati folk from Bhavai- and then moves to check comprehension and analysis through question-and-answer before giving out questionnaires bout home practices to be brought back later. Subsequent classroom activities (some continued in the wider school environment and at home) include segregation of different kinds of garbage, making compost pits, initiating community action, making things from discarded items, collecting press cuttings, drawing diagrams and pictures, writing and performing poems, songs, and plays on the issues. Important concerns include stimulating children to realize they can do something direct about these issues and creating a domino effect by involving parents and others.


Project 3: Parivartan

The proposal aims to ‘bring about a change in the conditions that face the Bhils (pre-Aryan indigenous people of western India), especially the Bhill women I Banaskantha’ (an economically and educationally backward area of Gujarat, bordering Rajasthan) through’ an extended and intensive programme of education aimed at attitude changes in the areas of social, cultural, gender and health issues. Thirty to thirty-five villages were selected to participate. The project has funding for three years from the MacArthur Foundation and support from the Manav Kalyan Trust, a social work organization active amongst the Bhils.

A fourth project (not assessed here) carried out by Darpana has involved the use of puppetry to educate villagers about the benefits of cattle immunization.

A Report

Project 1: Awakening Awareness

I visited Vidhyanagar HS, Usmanpura and Amrut School, Shahibaug: the former a local authority Gujarati-medium school, the later a private English-medium school. In both cases the level of alertness and participation by the children was impressive, perhaps more clearly so in the ' public' school: in spite of a class size of around 60, fairly dingy surroundings and the fact that the class took place as the last period of a very long day, the children were eager, bright and imaginative. (In many classes in Indian schools small-group and participatory work is very much the exception, partly for economic and plant-related reasons, partly because of ingrained traditionalist attitudes.)

I initially visited two schools, both in the public sector. Returning 18 months later I visited a further 3 municipal schools, one of which had joined the scheme at its own request. Activities were again clearly popular, attention and participation excellent, support from teachers and heads enthusiastic and results impressive in terms of things the children had made and composed. Even though in both projects there was not always complete consistency of the project team and there were a number of interruptions for holidays and exams, the rapport continued to be good and it was apparent that the children readily picked up the thread again. Teachers were supportive in spite of the heavily exam-syllabus-oriented operation of schools in the Indian system. (In the long term this is a problem which needs addressing at all levels up to MA: possibilities for real learning are all too frequently suffocated by force-feeding of material for regurgitation).

The initial outline indicates that the focus of the project is essentially on the ability and responsibility of the individual. The initial group of schools comprised four from the public and four from the private sector, focusing, as with Awakening Awareness, on sixth-grade children. The project takes eight-week blocks per issue: it receives funding from ETC. New Delhi, for a period of three years from April 1994. It emphasizes the intention to open out environmental education beyond the confines of an exam-oriented set of statistics.

The Annual Report 1995-96 records further planning meetings and workshop at the start of the second year, building on the experiences of the first. Three topic (water, garbage, energy) were covered in year one, and two (air and sound pollution, tree) developed for year two. Again, performances presented the issues and subsequent class sessions were structures around activities. In both years a closing function for all schools at Darpana allowed children to present the results of their work in their own performances; and the AMC School Board organized a further function for its participating schools in 1996. Approaches were also made by Doordarshan (TV), who filmed versions of the original performances for later release on its children's programme; and an invitation to an international workshop, Children in Charge for change, resulted in a presentation, contact with other NGOs, and inclusion in a write-up of NGOs' experiences in environmental education and participatory schemes (reviving Links, IUCN, Netherlands).

A case study of the project to date includes results of the questionnaire/interviews with participating children in order to determine outcomes. The questionnaire aimed to assess the suitability of the communication approach adopted by Jagruti: the knowledge and awareness gained by the students; resultant action by participants.

Results indicate that the initial performance (compared to subsequent demonstrations), survey forms, etc.) was far and away the most effective communicative method, remembered by virtually all students who were interviewed with reference to each of the first three topics covered (100%, 90%,100% respectively). Practical activities (making toys from waster materials, making a compost pit) also produced high retention in the case of topic 2 (50-75%). Questions about specific details indicated greater diversity, but in nearly all cases students had grasped the essential issue and retained a significant proportion of detailed awareness about, for example, specific causes of wasting energy and water or types of garbage and appropriate and inappropriate disposal methods. Subsequent action (talking to others, changing habits) was taken by a similar, and quite impressive, proportion of students, very frequently in excess of 50%.

The case study concludes that the communication approach was popular and effective; performing arts is a powerful educational tool and its use should be extended to other areas; knowledge -awareness-skill (KAS) gain of students shows a positive trend; more emphasis should be placed on the subsequent action phase in future. It further adds some general comments on environment education, including the following: 'to foster comprehension of complex wholes… the effective environment must be extended… to include the entire life-space of the student'; 'in addition the attitudinal climate needs to be one that frees the students emotionally to struggle with problems for which there are no easy and specific solutions';' the approach should be… to develop educational environments for facilitating a re-examination of basic premises, values, attitudes and perception.'

After two years most of the children who have participated in these two projects have moved to different (secondary) schools. However, they take with them in many cases an awareness of and enthusiasm for the methods and issues involved; and a positive climate has been created in the schools. Further work may need to take different forms (discussions are underway about the formation of ECO-clubs).

Project 3: Parivartan

The selected performers, some with experience in community work and all with some artistic ability in indigenous music and dance, though not thought of as performance, underwent a two-month training (one month of workshops on basic performance skills, awareness of issues, project methods; followed by initial visits to villages and subsequent planning of performance schedules). Trainers included the Jagruti team (on environmental issues), a representative from the Behavioural Science Centre (BSC), women's organizations (Jyoti Sangh, Ahmedabad and Sahiyar Group, Baroda), the Aga Khan Rural Support Group, and Darpana staff. During the programme the performers were not only sensitized to the issues but also socialized to the methodology by being invited to contribute their knowledge and skills, share in planning and develop discussion skills.

The original intention was to deal with a single topic each year (year 1: rural development; year 2: status of women; year 3: reproductive health), and to cover three aspects of each topic through performance and follow up. This schedule has been interpreted fairly liberally, in that the first rounds of performance have been concerned with alcohol abuse, blood feuds, and witchcraft.

Performances on the first two topics were held in over thirty villages, with between 100 and 500 people attending each. Some discussion took place after the performance and some between performers and host; the following day the performance team visited families in the village for follow-up discussion. Following the sessions, around 50 people pledged to give up alcohol and 4 villages agreed to resolve family feuds by negotiation. Villagers requested that the performances be shown in other communities also, but this was not possible within the schedule. A video recording of the two performances was completed.

I attended a performance on the topic of witchcraft in Khedbrahma district, along with some 200 to 300 villagers and the video team. The latter meant that this was a more 'formal' event than some previous performances. It was also interrupted by one of India's frequent power-cuts, but nobody minded very much. The style was presentational, street-theater, using traditional song, dance and narrative techniques derived from Bhavai and framed by a short contextualization and commentary by the project leader. Clearly the audience (from small children to village elders) enjoyed the performance. The (male) elders, questioned afterwards, were emphatic that it had enlightened them and given them new perspectives, both on categorizing women as witches and on giving credence to witchdoctors. They claimed that they would amend their behavior in future and pointed out that they had stopped abusing alcohol after a previous performance. Younger men confirmed this and said that attitudes and behaviour had changed and that they very much favoured this. The men said they were proud that members of their families were performing with the team. The performers themselves claimed that their lives had changed significantly that they were pleased and proud to be with the team (the leader and co-workers confirmed that the performers, particularly the women, had gained immensely in confidence and self-respect over the first year). Questioned by a fellow visitor, an American female theater-worker, the women were adamant that they wished to go on with performance and work of this kind even after the end of the current project.

Clearly these initial results are encouraging, particularly from the point of view of the reception of the performances and the sustained change in the performers themselves. Social attitudes in adults are unlikely to change overnight, but there is evidence both of significant shifts and of a willingness to consider hitherto acknowledge possibilities. Some doubts, of course remain, to do with the inevitably somewhat agit-prop format and ' missionary' zeal of performers and 'converts'. It is clear that these relatively unsophisticated people could be swayed by other messages from apparently authoritative sources. Against this, however, it should be pointed out that the performers, performance-form and project leader all have roots in the community and are therefore neither accorded undue reverence nor given particularly 'exotic' credibility.

Assessment

The reports above make it clear that all three projects have had success in many respects. They each set out to promote a growth of knowledge and awareness, to instigate changes in attitude, to stimulate subsequent responsible action, and to do all this by essentially performative and interactive methods which themselves articulate a model of learning, growth and change.

The methods used in the projects are tried and tested in many parts of the world, though somewhat less familiar in India.TIE (threatre in Education) is well-known in Britain as an educational methodology and as a way of raising awareness of issues, mainly in primary schools ( up to age 11); similar methods have been widely used, for example, in AIDS education in Africa. TIE usually starts with a performance and is followed up by interaction and discussion between the performance team and the target group; it also not infrequently involves subsequent project work, normally organized within the school by teachers. Thus performance leads into ongoing group and individual work. In addition to the focus on specific (e.g. environmental) issues, the methodology itself is perceived as transferable: learning through multi-media input and through doing is recognized as highly effective in many subjects.

Performative and interactive work with adults has major avenues of application in the socio-political and therapeutic spheres. The work of Augusto Boal (see his Theater of the Oppressed) uses a variety of forms of interactive and participatory performative situations (e.g. apparently 'impromptu' dramatized events or debates; Brechtian scenarios in which audience members are invited to take over characters' roles and indicate what they would do in the situation). Boal's principles include the development of listening skills, internalizing theater language, writing scenarios and incorporating alternative perspectives. There have been a number of applications of comparable methods in India, notably in Calcutta (Badal Sircar, Arun Mukherjee [Jana Sanskriti]), Kerala (KSSP), Karnataka (Ninasam), Tamil Nadu (ARP) and Delhi (Janam): these and other examples in Asia are documented in Eugene van Erven, The Playful Revolution (Indiana University Press, 1992). Drama therapy, much of it deriving from J. L. Moreno's Theater of Psychodrama, invites clients to dramatize problematic or traumatic events from their own lives in order to enable them to perceive the causative dynamics. Here also, therefore, performance both articulates new insights in a more thorough way and also invites participation and involvement in the cognitive process.

The projects have been thoroughly prepared and have functioned within a strong support network, including not only Darpana personnel but also workers in social and environmental organizations, with back-up support from educational leaders and financial support from both Indian and international sources. Project teams were thoroughly briefed and trained, and have frequently reconvened for further training and discussion. Not only the teams themselves but also the recipients have been consulted and involved in subsequent planning, ensuring ownership of the projects by as wide a spectrum as possible. The ethos of working together cooperatively which is found in performance contexts is particularly strong here, and has communicated itself to all involved. Both creative enjoyment and strong sense of commitment are evident throughout the project teams.

Outcomes

Knowledge and awareness gain is evident, both in the questionnaires administered as part of Jagruti, but also from direct responses of participants after performances and during follow-up sessions. Since the acceptance and internalization of new information is the initial stage in any reorganization of a living system, this platform is crucial to subsequent phases.

Change in attitude has clearly followed, in the cases, for instance, of children becoming alert to the need to conserve water and of villagers becoming aware that specific behavioral patterns were damaging to the community and could be changed. What occurs in this phase is the conscious realization that alternative possibilities exist. This realization can then lead to the assumption of individual or collective responsibility for action and change i.e. an element of conscious intention enters the scene: internalization becomes desire and leads to activation. All these phases have been evident in the projects described. Whether action for change is maintained over a span of time depends on a large number of factors, many of which lie outside the scope of the projects (e.g. the influence of parents, social environment, other aspects of education, economics, etc.). It does, however, appear that in the relatively short term a good deal of such positive action has been initiated and maintained.

Difficulties and strategies for resolution

Difficulties experienced fall mainly into three areas: logistical (time available, access to target group), resourcing (relatively small size of project teams, doubts about ongoing funding) and some aspects of methodology (how best to transform positive perceptions into sustainable action).

The first two require continued planning and consultation, for example, with educational authorities and funding bodies. Clearly, in the case both of schools and rural schemes, the optimum future scenario is for the projects to be extended to a wider constituency, and for this to occur as a result of action from within the target community: in other words, in the case of school principals, teachers, children and perhaps also parents to receive training from the initial project teams and then to take over the major responsibility for future provision, with the project team remaining available for back-up. In the case of rural communities, the same process, with the personnel being drawn from the villagers, would be appropriate. Here is already a back-up organization in the shape of the Manav Kalyan Tust, which operates many awareness-raising and social programmes.

In this context the interdependence of issues and methods needs to be emphasized. Any group which takes these projects forward needs to be provided, not merely with the relevant arguments and information, but also with the confidence and ability to communicate this through interactive and performative means. The whole thrust of the programmes is empowerment: it is vital for their effective continuance that the participatory mode does not become diluted to a passive form of reception.

The third issue raised above suggests the need for adding a stage to the process, or strengthening it where it is already in use. Currently the projects are strong on producing knowledge and awareness gain and relatively strong on instigating individual and communal shifts in attitude. To strengthen further the link between the undertaking of individual responsibility and the cementing of this in ongoing action (as well as to offer more learning-by-doing experience) more attention needs to be given to devising ways for participants to work together in small groups. This further internalizes understanding, spreads the burden of responsible action an lessens any anxiety which may be experienced in trying to influence a large group, particularly where as in the villages it may contain authority figures.

The relatively low cost of the projects (they involve personnel rather than plant and can largely be coordinated within limited areas) and the opportunity to divide funding responsibility between several agencies – local, national and international – favors their extension and continuation. Additionally, many of the issues targeted are likely, in the long term, to deliver social and environmental improvements which will be cost-effective. The projects fulfill their intention to deliver both values and value.

Conclusion

The fundamental proposal of the projects is that performance (understood in a wide sense) is a highly effective means of ‘environmental’ (again in a wide sense) education. It directly stimulates and instigates educative activity in individuals and offers them methods and opportunities for learning to work together. Such learning and doing creates changes in attitude and perception of the individual’s environment which issue into extended forms of interpersonal and social reorganization. Participants begin to reconfigure their world.

For all of us, that world depends largely on our relationships with our ‘environment’, whether we understand that in terms of the ‘others’ we live with (other sex, other race, other interracial groups, other religions, other species) or the natural phenomena surrounding us, and from which we are likewise not necessarily as separate as we have tended to assume.

The work then is outreach in many senses: involving our sense of who and what we are and how we perform our relationship to the world of which we are a part.

All violence constructs an other: it distances ‘self’ from ‘other’. It is based in the non-availability, the covering-up, of the sense of non-differentiation: that is, in the illusion that there is only the ‘skin-encapsulated ego’. It is fed by fear: the fear of invasion of ‘my’ space, ‘my’ body, ‘my’ language, by what has been demarcated as ‘other’. The demarcation is a form of categorizing, partitioning, sectioning; always involving hierarchy, role-assumptions, symbolic orders of some kind.

In performance, people touch. They touch themselves: they have to get in touch with their bodies, their emotions, rather than deny them. They experience directly, without the curtains of abstract terminology, what it is to feel. They empathize (with characters they are watching); they sympathize (with other human beings who can feel similarly); as audience they join together in feeling, they share pain or anger, they experience together the joy of a new insight or an unexpected resolution. So here they begin to touch one another, to sense that other is not always different from self, that ‘me’ and ‘my environment’ may be coextensive. The hierarchies and the barriers become more permeable. If they then learn to perform more consciously together, they extend that touching, that direct awareness and intone-ness. They begin directly to participate in themselves, in each other, in their environment: to commune and to communicate.

Clearly these initiatives are of more than local significance. Their importance in the national context is underlined by events like Ayodhya, plague, governmental corruption, by much in the history of post-independence India; and by similar events throughout the world. Education has to start by activating the capacities of individuals to take appropriate measures, to develop in and for themselves the ability to judge and respond, to learn that they can become responsible for their own attitudes.

This is not the only viable form of art, nor the only way to develop responsibility: but it is a practical, testable and direct addition to the aesthetic and educational repertoire, which deserves widespread dissemination, not least because it challenges everyone to rediscover in themselves their own ability to care and to express that in practice.