In Two Minds and Two bodies: what happens when we think in role?

In Two Minds and Two bodies: what happens when we think in role?

Amanda Kipling

https://doi.org/10.64741/891366uvyftj

This paper is written from a presentation at the Dorothy Heathcote Now! conference held at Goldsmiths November 2024. It examines a particular moment recorded within an interview which was part of my doctoral thesis: In Two Minds: What Happens when we Think in Role?

The narrative begins with the interviewee’s statement:

Drama helped me escape my reality and face it at the same time (Kiara, 2019).

This paradox forms the thematic core of the study, which uses Kiara’s recollection of a drama exercise where she saw herself depicted by another student. The paper uses this moment to explore how being in role can catalyse self-recognition and healing transformation.

Theoretical contributions are drawn from theorists based both within and outside of the world of educational drama: Stanislavsky (1863-1938), Vygotsky (1896-1934), Bolton, Heathcote (1926-2011), Hume (1711-1776), O’Neill, and Merleau-Ponty (1908-1961).

The paper advocates for drama in schools taught by subject specialists and greater consideration of the in-role process and embodied learning in drama lessons.  Teachers of drama are invited to reconsider the work of theatre practitioners not just as works to be studied at curriculum level but to reframe their pedagogical contribution as educational dramatists. Practitioners are invited to consider the contribution made by specific theorists whose studies originate from outside educational drama but whose ideas impinge powerfully on the drama classroom. The study also explores the drama classroom as an exciting dual world of fiction and authenticity offering opportunities for transformational, healing self-discovery and some theoretical perspectives for planning, analysing and evaluating what happens in a drama classroom.

Introduction

After 17 years as ‘Head of Drama’ in an inner London secondary school, and 10 years at Goldsmiths leading PGCE Drama, I began my doctoral studies to understand what happens when we think in role.

While teaching in school, I had witnessed transformation in young people who had said that it was drama which helped them to change. However, they struggled to explain how and why this took place. I was keen to delve deeper, explore the underlying processes and to illuminate well-known theories with others from theorists who, in my experience, are not usually drawn upon in the educational drama field.

This paper traces a chain of linked theories which I believe helps to explain and understand some of the healing transformational processes taking place in drama classrooms when students are in role. This could help to deepen and focus planning for drama teachers who hold the same fascination with the mysteries of being in role, as I do, and provide some tools for securing richer opportunities for self-transformation in the drama classroom.

Overview

The project involved a message from an alumna, re-named Kiara, from about 20 years beforehand who contacted me through social media. Fondly recalling her drama lessons, she claimed

Drama helped me escape my reality and face it at the same time.

This provocative contradiction provided the focus for the study. I visited Kiara in Scotland for an interview and then created a day-long drama workshop around her interview findings for the PGCE Drama student-teachers to explore. The interview was completed just before lockdown and the workshop had to be online with a new software called ‘Zoom’.

At the time, schools were teaching online during lockdown and so necessity gave birth to this innovative practice for teaching drama for educational purposes across all sectors. Recording the online workshop was also a new way of gathering research data in the educational drama field, enabling both working processes and devised performance pieces to be captured as intended and as prepared, for online sharing.

The workshop itself is not featured in this paper but its role within the research requires some context. Kiara’s words served as the stimulus for the workshop which was designed to explore what her contradictory words could mean. Students followed tasks which involved discussion, analysis and creative dramatic responses drawing on their own experiences of being in role. Students positioned themselves as artists, co-researchers and teachers interchangeably throughout. During the workshop the students either touched upon or explored in greater depth some of the theoretical aspects presented in the study’s literature review, not having read any of the sources. Thus, the models referred to here have been ‘discovered’ by the students during the workshop and could be considered a kind of data in their own right as well as being models proposed by key practitioners and thinkers.

This paper’s structure is designed to avoid a weighty section about the workshop itself and cut more directly to the findings. The theoretical frameworks identified by the students have been selected for this paper, forming a condensed version of the original literature review. This literature review is applied in the form of layered lenses to a specific moment- or vignette – in the interview which serves as a purposeful vehicle for unpacking the findings in the study.

Ethics

Kiara has granted full permission for the data and recording to be used for the doctoral study. Additional permission was re-sought and granted for this paper and this included consent for her recorded voice to be featured so that her authentic voice could be heard.

Methodology

This interpretivist research project employed a broadly ethnographic approach reflecting Saldana’s observation that the roles of dramatists and ethnographic researchers are close to identical (Saldaña 1999). Indeed, the nature of the research unfolded like the development of a play.

Drama practitioner Gallagher presents critical ethnography as offering

…the dramatic world rich theoretical scaffolding in order to help the researcher interrogate both the situatedness and the agency of the drama’s and the classroom’s characters (Gallagher 2006: 63).

This approach supported the focus on self-transformation and recognised the double existence of being in role. It acknowledged the distancing dynamic which is key to the development of perception. While the research did not seek to emancipate participants, as in critical theory, the focus was on researching the emancipatory nature of healing self-transformation taking place within the unique space of being in role.

In Nelson’s Practice as Research model, drama practitioner Nelson interpreted Schon’s Knowing-in-action into knowing-how (tacit, unconscious); Reflection-in-action into knowing-what (spontaneous, conscious response) and Reflection-on action into knowing-that (conscious consideration on actions taken) (Schon 2016).  Conscious of the fluid way in which these relate to each other and how all three orbit around drama practice, Nelson describes this as ‘theory imbricated with practice’ (Nelson 2013: 37). This model captures the nature of the in-role world by adopting three roles within its structure and the fluidity of the environments involved with accompanying modes of existence.

This assisted me in how I positioned myself (and the PGCE students) as researcher at varying stages of the research process, and provided a model to identify Kiara’s thinking processes in the example studied here. I adapted these lenses further, relating knowing-how to the artist (or actor), knowing-what to the teacher, and knowing-that to the researcher, arriving at a model loosely related to a/r/tography.

Method

Kiara’s apparently paradoxical words opened up the study and an interview with Kiara in Scotland followed. A small section of that interview is unpacked here to illustrate the theoretical concepts which have resulted from the research. The interview was prepared about two weeks beforehand. Hammersley and Atkinson explain that there are many ways into an interview using varying stimuli (Hammersley et al. 2019: 124). I simply asked Kiara to talk more about what she meant by her own words:

Drama helped me escape my reality and face it at the same time.

Recalling the shy teenager of years ago I wanted to make sure Kiara had plenty of time to ‘find the words’ (Clough et al. 2007: 146). I suggested she might like to make a spider-gramme or notes. She chose not to bring any preparatory material – I am not sure if there was any – and spoke seemingly authentically in the interview.

Atkins and Wallace emphasise the value in conducting interviews in the interviewee’s ‘natural settings’ (Atkins et al. 2015: 3). This was problematic – Kiara was essentially a Londoner and we would be talking about her experience when a teenager in a London school. However, she suggested meeting in the local library, which was also part arts centre, with a pleasant café and where she would usually be with her children on a Saturday morning. They looked at books while we held the interview at a full-length window overlooking the beautiful loch with comfortable chairs conveniently and coincidentally set at right angles to each other. Now, at the time of the interview, it was clear that this was indeed her own ‘natural setting’. She had chosen it as an adult with full control over her life and circumstances and it was from this setting she had chosen to share her story.

Context of Vignette

I have no recollection of this precise lesson to which Kiara referred but sometimes I led a Stanislavskian based exercise relating to intense observation of others. This is often presented as an exaggeration exercise so the individual being ‘copied’ saw themselves in varying caricatured forms. I didn’t take the exercise to this exaggerated level with GCSE groups to avoid vulnerable students feeling uncomfortable. However, the first part of the exercise alone – adopting a stance which indicated another – was powerful enough.

Vignette:
Click here for audio

K…I can’t remember what lesson at drama …but we done something to get into each other’s roles but one person had to be me and I had to be them. I can’t remember what exactly it was but all of us had to be somebody else
AK       Hm hm
K          and there’s this person acting me and that.. that’s not me I don’t like that… surely that’s not me
AK       Really?
K          Yeah. I didn’t like that very much so I started to change my ways and my ways of thinking on how I was going to get past that. I didn’t like that person…

Literature Review and Theoretical Framework

The interleaving of a layered literature review with analytical visitations to the above vignette echo Nelson’s reference to ‘theory imbricated with practice’ (Nelson 2013: 37). It echoes the structure Nelson describes with the original vignette in the centre with Schon’s refashioned three kinds of knowing orbiting around it.

The theoretical explanations are written as I adopted the ‘knowing-that’ role of researcher, considering the theoretical aspects of the theorists. The framed visitations to the vignette carry the ‘knowing-what’ perspective of the teacher applied to the observations of the ‘knowing-how’ behaviours of Kiara (the pupil ‘actor’).

This presentation leads the reader through a Stanislavskian foundation regarding the process of being during authentic role play. Vygotsky’s development of ‘perezhivanie’ extends the study in a developmental psychological direction. It is applied to the vignette regarding the repositioning of ourselves and how we perceive and experience situations when in role. Bolton, Heathcote and O’Neill provide insights into how these impact on thinking. Philosophical theories of Hume superimpose models of thinking processes illuminating the impact of the emotions over the direction of thought when in role. Merleau-Ponty’s phenomenological view of the nature of embodied learning within this context is added to this theoretical blend to scrutinise the depths of this dramatic moment.

This study exposes the deeply rooted origins of educational drama within theatre-making and draws together views from the multidisciplinary team of thinkers. It offers views which inform the healing and self-transformational dynamics at play in the drama classroom.

The theories here were also explored, uncovered or alluded to by PGCE students during their creative and reflective responses to Kiara’s words:

Drama helped me escape my reality and face it at the same time.

Interleaved Theoretical Analysis of Vignette

This section is presented as a series of theoretical overviews interleaved as lenses applied to the original vignette. These superimposed lenses develop a depth of analysis to the vignette and their applications are presented within framed boxes.

Starting with Theatre: Stanislavskian perspectives

Stanislavsky developed analytical and theoretical works which remain regarded as classic sources for theatre practitioners today (Stanislavsky 1936/1980). For the purposes of this paper, I have selected the elements which are most relevant to Kiara’s drama classroom and the lesson to which she refers.

Stanislavsky’s approach stems from developing awareness of self. To live a role as opposed to ‘playing a part’, an actor needs to have extensive self-awareness, of being both inside and outside of themselves, to be aware of their subconscious. This fundamental level of Stanislavsky’s theory is deeply relevant to all learning. Self-knowledge and understanding are key to having control over how one learns. Additionally, dramatists must extend this awareness to the role they are playing. Thus, a partnership with the role develops as these two selves experience the world together and learning possibilities are doubled.

This is further complicated by the other – a fellow role player or actor who is also self and other. Consequently, the learning levels are doubled and opportunities multiplied. I have seen students who usually avoid each other in school yet create dynamic work and who learn when they are both in role, forging an exciting, experiential relationship in role which, for some reason, cannot or does not exist in the non-fiction world.

Stanislavsky emphasises the importance of role being an extension of the self; an authentic part of the actor. He argued that an actor does not

tear out his soul and replace it with one he has rented (Stanislavsky 1980:177).

This lacks authenticity and produces artificiality or pretence. Instead, we extend our souls through emotion memory so that

the soul of the person he portrays is a combination of the living elements of his own being (Stanislavsky 1980:178).

Thus, everyone’s Hamlet will be different. By this soul extension, actors become able to connect with a wider and wider range of roles. In a drama classroom students are enabled by being in role to move into a space unshackled by their here-and-now context which dictates a specific view of the world. This process opens up previously inaccessible opportunities for learning, extending their world by doing so – and this is generated from within.

When able to draw these dynamics together the next partner in the triad is the audience. Having immersed oneself into this other world – as self and other – with another – also as self and other – this needs to be ‘irradiated’. The actor transmits powerful energies which fill the auditorium thus drawing the audience into the fiction. Thus, the actor, the role and the other actors and roles are – in ‘communion’ with each other in the fictional world created. These initial fundamental ideas of Stanislavsky have deep organic implications, offering a simple structure and language for learning at a firmly rooted level and engaging spiritual and existential principles unique to the dynamics in a drama classroom.

Vignette I: An application of dramatic Stanislavskian theory

The student depicting Kiara has observed Kiara very closely. They have embodied the essence of her persona by inhabiting the role of Kiara from deeply within. This has been irradiated most powerfully so that Kiara is struck as audience by this moment of self-recognition: a moment of shock-charged communion with the other, and yet at the same time, the self.

Protected by the fiction, the truth of that moment packs a hard, yet anaesthetised, punch. Kiara not only recognises herself as a physical representation but also sees in the other student, a captured an image within. She is not looking at a mirror, she is looking at an x-ray of the role she has been playing and sees the mismatch between that and the self she desires to be.

The depiction goes beyond the here-and-now and the irradiation illuminates Kiara’s future. A life-changing decision is made in that moment.

In this instant Kiara also realises that if she, as audience, recognises this irradiation as a prophetic depiction of herself, the student she is observing must do so as well, and with this powerful micro performance, so will everyone else.

Maybe Kiara realises that her emotion memory has forged a role for her driven by feelings of powerlessness which have been forced upon her by external circumstances. (This is divulged elsewhere in the interview). She did not choose these developments of her soul. As Stanislavsky describes, in role, she can extend her real self in other directions and have control over what these are. At this point opportunities for emancipation to self-transform are realised and embraced.

Moving to the audience: Vygotskian Perspectives

The potential for deep organic learning through role considering the spiritual and existential aspects of learning was identified by Vygotsky, originally a theatre critic who worked closely with Stanislavsky. The dramatist’s influence is clearly present as fundamental in Vygotsky’s later work as educational psychologist. In this section, selected aspects of Vygotsky’s thinking are superimposed to provide a more detailed picture of how learning in role takes place within the individual, moving from broad spiritual and emotional concepts towards a more concrete model: perezhivanie.

Kiara’s vignette above illustrates the kind of encounter Vygotsky experienced in the audience of Stanislavsky’s theatre. It illustrates well the roots of his later developed work on learning, deftly summarised by Mitchell:

Dramatic interaction therefore lies at the heart of Vygotsky’s mediational process. This interaction manifests as inter- and intra- personal collision, conflict, contradiction and crisis in a struggle towards self- transformation – all of which are hallmarks of a dialectic process which Vygotsky saw at work in the unfolding development of the human psyche. (Mitchell 2016: 22-23).

Perezhivanie is not a well-used term in educational drama as it is challenging to interpret. It is a term used by Stanislavsky, developed by Vygotsky and most pertinent to the example studied here:

Vygotsky employs perezhivanie in his later writings to establish action(s) within a setting that allow for an individual to experience given circumstances, engage with them via action in some capacity, and thereby learn and develop through that action. Action within the context of perezhivanie is culturally situated and typically includes cooperation with others (Glassman et al. 2023).

Participants are encouraged to ‘feel’ and express different emotions, not necessarily as ‘raw’ felt emotions but rather, through expressive forms which may externalise ideas and emotions and extend the scope of the individual’s lived experience (Davis 2015: 64).

Here we see the rudiments of healing self-transformation being planted within ourselves when we go into role. This enables the role to distance the self, re-perceive our world differently, and re-experience unpleasant experiences as an observer. From this stance, we can gain purchase on our understanding and this enlightenment is a vital first step towards empowerment to bring about change which can heal ourselves and our situation. (This is explored in more detail later in Bolton’s ‘Identification’.)

Vygotsky identified the potential for cognitive development within Stanislavsky’s work. He focused on extending the different perspectives which could be adopted – broadening perception and understanding and this framing bears a more immediately relevant connection to educational settings. In so doing, Vygotsky restored ancient practices in a contemporary context: theatre as essentially a space of learning about ourselves, our worlds and our relationships with them and each other. (This view echoes Saldaña’s earlier words about the rich overlap between the work of ethnographers and dramatists.)

The immediate connections made with Brechtian theatre are clear. Brecht uncovered a way of directing the power of irradiation away from its hypnotic effect on an audience towards a more interactive engagement by the distancing effect of Verfremdung. (Cardullo 2013). We see this very starkly presented in the theatre forms of Boal’s Image Theatre and Forum Theatre where the more intellectual, cognitive engagement with theatre is a dominant experience. Often seen as opposing theatre practices, we see in this moment the power of both Stanislavsky’s theories and those of Brecht working together as forceful drivers in the drama taking place within Kiara.

Vignette II: An application of psychological Vygotskian theories, supported by dramatic Brechtian and Boalian perspectives

Examining the vignette in the terms above, Kiara does not initiate this perezhivanie process herself. Indeed, it seems to have caught her unawares. However, she cannot help herself and surrenders both to the role she is in and the one she is observing. She observes herself through the protection the art form offers. The other student is protected by role and irradiates this inner truth unencumbered by the usual social and emotional obstacles of the here-and-now. There is a purity of truth in what the other student shows her within this moment of fiction. Kiara re-experiences herself, not as a person hiding a truth away from herself and others but distanced as audience – also re-positioned in the role -as one gazing at an x-ray which all can see.

Vygotsky’s perezhivanie clearly involves aspects of Stanislavskian theatre but pre-empts strong aspects of Brechtian theatre. In this example, Kiara is drawn in by the Stanislavskian ‘irradiation’ created by the other student and has protection through the simplicity of the observation exercise. She is not actively involved in a drama piece with this student – she just has to open her eyes and observe and this involves a strong element of acceptance to what she sees. There is a definite vital surrender to what is seen in communion with self, other and audience.

In this instance however, she also experiences the Brechtian distancing effect – another layer of protection which both forces and enables her to acknowledge the x-ray and see its future. This being ‘an exercise’ provides a Brechtian distancing quality and this offers an opportunity for her to observe, re-perceive and acknowledge from a safe space.

Into the Classroom: Bolton, Heathcote, O’Neill and Educational Drama perspectives

At this point the educational benefits of theatre are clear in terms of development of perception, understanding, empathy and illumination. The works of twentieth century educational dramatists built on these ideas specifically within a classroom context. In the section these are now placed as another lens to begin a focus on this learning as taking place not in a theatre setting but in a drama classroom. It starts with crystalising the value of the fiction:

The teaching is authentic and yet it achieves its authenticity through ‘the big lie’, since it operates within a powerful imagined context created through the inner dramatic rules of time, space, role and situation… Thinking from within a situation immediately forces a different kind of thinking (O’Neill 1995: vii).

Bolton claims that in drama we are ‘…holding two worlds in mind at the same time’ (Bolton 1984: 141) and this is echoed by O’Neill:

The essential nature of the dramatic medium is a liberating act of imagination, a dual consciousness in which the real and fictional worlds are held together in the mind (O’Neill 1985: 159) (my italics).

At this stage the emphasis is on the drama living in the mind: a point which will be further considered shortly.

Vignette III: An Application of Educational Drama Perspectives

Kiara and the other student have both entered an agreement to take the fiction as a truth (as we do when watching theatre.) They are both in two worlds as themselves and other in this fiction. Kiara’s in-role self is capable of escaping the restriction of her here-and-now self and can perceive differently in this context. She is protected by the fiction, the role and the distancing of the ‘big lie’. Her here-and-now defences are suspended from duty allowing – ironically – a truth to be revealed to her.

Against this backdrop, Bolton suggested a model of thinking in role which comes about because of straddling these two worlds. He calls this ‘identification’. ‘The child extracts a ‘truth’ from the situation as s/he sees it for the purpose of representation. What is represented is an understanding of, not a facsimile of, reality’ (Heathcote 2015: 70–87). Bolton’s ‘Identification’ is split into two parts: firstly a passive stage of understanding, or illumination, with a second later, more active stage of interpretation.

Vignette IV: Application of Bolton’s Identification – a theory of thinking.

The other student has captured an understanding of Kiara’s truth. The truth extracted strikes Kiara – she was not actively seeking this. In this moment of theatre she was open to acceptance of this truth and she understood it.

In this instance, Kiara was struck by understanding. She knew what she saw and recognised it instantly. She has an instant response of not liking it but had to ‘face’ it. Bolton’s first stage of identification is ‘understanding’ and it is illustrated here clearly. ‘Interpretation’ is an active state of mind when the understanding is processed into action – mental or physical.

Here we see an interesting point between the two stages as Kiara understood what she saw.

I started to change my ways and my ways of thinking on how I was going to get past that. I didn’t like that person.

Kiara interpreted that into a need for urgent change and resolved to do so in that moment with an intention to move towards interpretation. However, she didn’t know in that moment how she was going to self-transform. Understanding started immediately – interpretation took longer and paved the way to re-identification, and healing self-transformation.

I take the observations of O’Neill and Bolton further and suggest that these two worlds held in the mind overlap and become one. O’Neill later indicates thinking along similar lines, echoing Stanislavsky’s concept of soul extension:

‘The students inhabit their roles as experts…with increasing conviction, complexity, and truth. They grow into their rolesin a way that goes far beyond the functional as they experience the enlargement of both identity and capacity within the tasks they undertake and the challenges they encounter’ (O’Neill 1995: viii) (my italics).

The worlds are, it seems, no longer just ‘in the mind’ but are experienced at an existential level. At this point we arrive at the unique feature of a drama lesson and have some idea of its deep foundational roots. This starts to formulate a language for supporting the expression of what takes place when in role.

A Philosophical approach: Hume’s model of thinking

Drama educationalist, Eriksson (2007) draws on an early study about distancing by Bullough (1912). He explains that we encounter ‘a very hands-on fear experience’ which is abstracted into an ‘aesthetic experience’ (Eriksson 2007: 8). (My italics) This notion of fear being an essential part of theatre making had been visited some time earlier by Hume. This section superimposes a lens which considers the nature of fear in a drama classroom and provides insight into how this can be managed both profitably and safely in a lesson.

Hume (1711-1776) produced a model of how we think. He also considered fear, asserting that fear is only permissible in religion and in theatre (Hume 2008). In the vignette we are already positioned within theatre making, at the same time, the deeply spiritual and existential dynamics at play are being made apparent. When in role, we surrender ourselves to an unknown fiction and this inevitably carries with it an excitement, anxiety or fear.

Hume claimed that we think involving a complex chained sequence of thought associations providing the basis for the development of logical thought. However, he concluded that we don’t actually follow this logical chain of thoughts; instead we are led by our emotions. We do what we want to do and support this with a fictitious argument of logic: a lie. (Hume 1739/2008: 143).

‘…the assistance is mutual betwixt the judgement and the fancy, as well as betwixt the judgement and passion; and that belief not only gives vigour to the imagination, but that a vigorous and strong imagination is of all talents the most proper to procure belief and authority’ (Hume 2008: 100).

Here the connection between thinking and the drama classroom are forced into the same space and this is a critical point for all classrooms. It is by engaging in a fiction, or lie, that ironically, we may locate truths. In role, we elect to encounter the essence of whatever the unknown produces. The fiction removes the pressure, the cluttering obligations thrust upon us as learners as we pursue knowledge, which cause us to litter our here-and-now lives with untruths in an attempt to defend our passion-driven decisions. We can face the fear of the hitherto unknown. With Hume’s logical linked thinking rejected by the climate of the fiction, our passions are allowed to progress unhindered by the need for logical defence. The thinking chain is, in effect, reversed and heads towards, rather than away from, the essence of the unknown. Thus, truths are enabled to come to us through our fictitious selves and provoke authentic learning.

Vignette V: Application of Hume’s Theory of thinking and the passions

Kiara had made a long chain of associated thoughts as a protection against the outer world – a defence ready for when confronted about ‘spiralling out of control’ (Kiara 2019).  She was driven by her emotions at the time and had done as Hume described – made a fiction to protect herself, to validate her actions and avoid the ‘essence’ of the situation. However, the environment in a drama lesson unravels this process. We suspend disbelief, agree to take the drama fiction as a truth and expose ourselves to what happens. We perceive our worlds anew. Unwittingly the other student had played a vital role in this process by simply following the task. The impact on Kiara, however, was life-changing. The fiction of the drama illuminated the fiction she had made for herself in the here-and-now.

She recalls wrestling with that moment but she now had to face the untruth she had created, recognise the false security it had offered (another untruth) reject it and start again. It must have been a moment of great fear and courage. There must have been a glimmer of promise at least, in that moment, which made her emotions decide to embrace drama to help her find her way towards interpretation. Maybe she knew that fictitious drama would continue to help her find a truthful way forward for herself.

In a drama lesson, we must encounter the essence of whatever the unknown produces, reversing our usual thinking processes, allowing us to draw nearer to the essence of what is occurring. The drama teacher needs to facilitate a navigation out of role, carrying these experiences back to the here-and-now without losing track of them and then support the translation of these into a here-and-now language while protecting the essence as far as possible.

Into the Body: The Phenomenological Approach of Merleau-Ponty

Hume argues that the more we think, the more symbolic language is involved causing us to drift further and further away from – not drilling closer to – the ‘essence’ of the subject. Complementing this, the work of phenomenologist Merleau-Ponty’s is about essences and how we access these. Unsurprisingly, his work does not focus on the thinking which involves symbolising words and concepts like Hume, but on the body and how sensations and feelings inform our thinking.  He sees the body as a site of learning and suggests that we may access essences more readily through our bodies, than our minds. His work is drawn in here to provide an additional complementary layer to Hume’s contribution and which provides a theoretical connection which completes this layered model designed to illuminate the thinking process when in role.

Very helpfully for the drama classroom, Merleau-Ponty claims that the world is made up of representations and that each individual’s representations are different, dictated by various prior experiences. This has already been illustrated by Kiara’s facing of the world she was perceiving initiated by external circumstances but which she had accepted and was reinforcing for herself.  Merleau-Ponty asserts that we ‘summon up’ what we need or want to perceive, providing the example of looking for a parking space. We consciously expunge pedestrians, shops, no parking signs in our perceptions and ‘summon up’ spaces for perusal and assessment for parking.

He concludes:

‘We must not, therefore, wonder whether we perceive a world, we must instead say: the world is what we perceive’ (Merleau-Ponty 2002: xviii)

This section chimes with Stanislavskian and Vygotskian thinking, and with a sideways nod to Hume, Merleau-Ponty claims that our thoughts are not restricted by our existence. Instead, we engage in our existence to extend our thoughts. Once again, we see that the value of the dual world of the drama classroom offers rich opportunities for soul extension for the dual self involved. With fictitious existences and accompanying truths multiplied, fueled by fear, ‘I make common cause with the gaze’ and ‘surrender myself to the spectacle’ (Merleau-Ponty 2002: 227/263).

Vignette VI: Application of Merleau-Ponty’s Philosophy

Kiara had summoned up her own world from her representations. While these may have been made of truths, they had been selected and fashioned into a world which was leading nowhere. A somewhat self-destructive pathway guided by external factors beyond her control had dictated a world and existence to her. She had become engulfed into that world and was only ‘summoning up’ facets of that world.

In this drama lesson however, this world was shockingly shattered by the other student who not only showed the eternal and internal present but also irradiated the future. In this fear-stricken moment of theatre, she had to embrace the idea of reviewing her world of representations, expunge her habitual ‘summoning up’ and allow new representations to formulate.

By doing so, she showed that she was not going to be restricted by her thoughts. She was going to extend her perceived world and extend her soul – her in-role self – to extend her thoughts. That way she would reach interpretation.

What better setting for this to take place than the drama classroom?

The instantaneous nature of the realisation not only builds the idea that these two worlds eclipse one another and become one but also remind us of those moments in theatre when our hearts skip a beat, we experience goosebumps, a shiver in the spine, a sick feeling in the stomach. When we are immersed into the world of role at an existential level, there are moments when our in-role bodies tell our minds something: not the other way round.

Merleau-Ponty had an interest in patients who were deemed ‘insane’. His radical attitude was that we could learn a great deal about ourselves by doing so – that they had a great deal to offer the so called ‘sane’ in terms of learning about themselves. Merleau-Ponty was particularly interested in people who believed they had extra limbs known as ‘phantom’ limbs. He ascertained that the body was telling the brain that there was a third limb: not vice versa.

Breaking down this concept into some theories about how the body can ‘know’ something and communicate this to the brain, Merleau-Ponty provides some simple concepts about this phenomenon which are recognisable in the drama classroom.

We kinaesthetically build a collection of impressions and use these to connect bodily behaviours together. This is a body schema. Our habit body is the baseline framework and then there is the ‘body at this moment’ – informed by habit body but which can reach beyond the established habitual model. (Morris 2012: 55).

When something is really learnt, the body schema rearranges itself to absorb the new knowledge and then the body becomes a ‘grouping of lived through meanings’. (Morris 2012: 67)

Our bodies tell our minds information about ourselves and each other before our minds have a chance to fully perceive the situation. For example, our bodies tell us when someone is angry or uncomfortable and this is projected onto our own bodies. We have an understanding of each other through

 …the reciprocity of my intentions and the gestures of others, of my intentions and gestures discernible in the conduct of other people. It is as if the other person’s intention inhabited my body and mine his. (Merleau-Ponty 2002: 215).

Observing someone in action, we engage a double awareness of the body of our own and of the other. Consequently, we are internally shadowing the action of the other as if it were ourselves performing it (Romdenh-Romluc 2011: 141)

Vignette VII: Application of Merleau-Ponty’s Theories of Embodiment

Kiara was in a drama situation and therefore was in two bodies – her own and what could be called the ‘phantom body’ of the role, as was the other student. Both bodies engage in outreach operations because they are not bound by there-and-now but are in a fiction; an imagined world.

Kiara’s classmate’s body irradiated to Kiara a representation of Kiara. Kiara’s body reciprocated, recognising itself as if through an x-ray and the understanding was instant. It came through the body. We can hear the body schema reassembling itself as the mind catches up and wrestles with what has happened.
Surely that’s not me

Our habit body is rooted in our habitual past. The body in this moment is the body present and its outreach operations are magnified and multiplied when in an abstract creative mode. It is in this fuelled plane where we can perceive a projection into the future. We ‘incorporate the past into the present, and weld that present into a future (Merleau-Ponty 2002: 456).

Vignette VIII: Application of Merleau-Ponty’s theory about the futuristic body

Kiara’s body present wants to stay as it is and its energies behave by holding Kiara back – centripetally – in habit body or body past. 

However, Kiara is in role and her phantom body behaves by reaching out toward the hitherto unknown, centrifugally summoning up new and unthought of experiences for body future.

Not only did the other student show Kiara her story (body past) and her current self in the world (body present), they also a captured a sense of where she was headed: body future, as in a prophetic x-ray. Kiara’s body recognised this. By reciprocation, Kiara experienced what her classmate showed her. She experienced herself.

This journey mapped through these vignettes has tracked the development of how we think in role drawing upon varying theoretical models from the early work of dramatist Stanislavsky to contemporary thinking regarding the body as a site of learning. The selection shared here was steered by the ideas and thoughts raised by the PGCE students during their workshop. This raises questions about how much students – of any age- inherently know about their own learning and how drama can assist in helping them to discover and articulate these.

Discussion

This study exposes varying aspects of a moment in a drama lesson. The reflective lenses refashioned by Nelson and further adapted by myself have carouselled in this account, and orbited around the focal vignette. This process has traced aspects relating to theatre, psychology, education, existentialism, thinking and embodiment all galvanising relationships between theatre and life and illuminating the processes which take place in a drama classroom. These thinkers from varying fields of thought with their differing language and approaches all reinforce each other’s concepts and build together a model of what happens when we think in role and how this lends itself to self-discovery and healing transformation.

While it would not be possible to plan all these dynamics into a lesson, it is probable that all these are at play to some degree or another within the drama classroom. The research has identified some of the educational drama elements at play and endeavoured, by harnessing a combination of theories from various fields of academic study, to bring these to the surface. By so doing, phenomena which may have been observed or reciprocated by drama teachers, may now be more deeply understood by having a language and structure which could deepen insight into planning and evaluation processes. This would allow the curriculum content to penetrate deeper learning as theatre was designed to do, and has done, for centuries.

Implications

This micro study of a few lines from the interview demonstrates some valuable examples from very different practitioners. Their work could be used more broadly to enrich the educational drama value of the classroom while following the curriculum content.

While Stanislavsky is ‘taught’ as a practitioner, and applied to practical theatre-making, his theories could be used as educational drama devices to develop a deep language for the complexities of being in role and the developing relationship with the self. It is a language which enables an expression of self-transformation and could be harnessed easily from an early age to enrich wellbeing. For example, instead of exploring ‘How did you feel?’, maybe we could develop questions along different lines.

What happened to you in role and what new thoughts occurred to you about what happened?

Reversing the above argument, Vygotsky’s developed perezhivanie is a model which could be taught explicitly as a term in the drama classroom in partnership with work on practitioners like Brecht and Boal. It can be applied to describing the actor/audience relationship as well as to the personal learning of the student. It is a valuable model relating to exploration of mental health and wellbeing and could become part of the drama vocabulary for addressing challenging issues and to structure character study.

I wonder why it is we can relate to this piece of drama?
What is this drama telling/showing us which we might not see if we were experiencing this first hand?
What does that character’s world look like to them in this scene?

Hume’s ideas about fear and how we learn from facing this in theatre are deeply engaging and inform theatre-making as well as experiential drama. His theories on thinking offer in-depth opportunities for character analysis and increasing awareness of one’s own thinking. Reversing this process in drama to arrive at an essence is a challenging process but one which holds great educational potential – whether this is successfully reached or not.

So Romeo/Hamlet/Othello all make a very comprehensive rationale for doing what they are doing. What might that chain of logistical thinking look like?
Where is it actually taking them?
What shift in thinking along that chain may have avoided the tragedy?

A few of Merleau-Ponty’s models are illustrated here and these provide simply descriptive language to help describe what is happening in role through what I would call our ‘phantom’ bodies. These models also lend themselves to exploring character at curriculum level whilst deepening metacognition. They offer opportunities to explore our bodily responses to theatre, audience, drama and ourselves which is a fruitful place to begin work on this under explored response with younger classes.

My skin went goosepimply during that scene – did anyone else’s? At what point?
We all gasped at the same time during that piece– what were our bodies telling us?

While the process of entering role is often layered and gradual, this study asks us to consider how students are led out of role. When deep experience has taken place, the double individual must be returned to being one without losing the vibrant learning of the phantom self.More consideration could be given to how we might allow some valid lesson time for what Merleau-Ponty would call initial body schema re-assemblage.

Which part of your body will come out of role first?
Which part remains in role?
What makes it want to stay in role longest?
What does your in-role self have to say about what it realised/considered during that experience?

These perspectives illuminate the thinking processes which take place when in role which are deep and complex and difficult to capture in writing once out of role and subject to the out of role process of ‘retrieval’. With the lenses offered here, drama teachers are positioned to contemplate and design strategies for assisting this process to meet the demands of the  both at Key Stage Four and Five which are heavily dependent on written content. Capturing spontaneous monologues digitally is not a new practice in drama classrooms. However, capturing spontaneous responses to drama work as audience tends to be sifted by the identification of examination criteria, sidelining other more visceral experiences like embodied responses. I suggest that opportunities for deeper learning and growth are being sacrificed at the altar of examination demands and that there are still opportunities for resurrecting these and enriching academic results at the same time.

To conclude, I return to O’Neill who embraces all the aspects exposed and explored here by reminding us of the vital and unique learning which drama offers us all – actors, researchers and teachers alike -that to engage in drama is to engage in ‘the process of becoming’. (O’Neill 1985: 161)

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Notes on Author

Dr Amanda Kipling leads the PGCE Drama programme at Goldsmiths, University of London, and is chair of London Drama. Her recent doctoral thesis is In Two Minds: what happens when we think in role? Her researchexplores the transformational nature of drama focusing on the in-role process and the opportunities this provides within classroom settings.

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