Abstracts
Abstract
For Indigenous youth in Canada, times are challenging, but the challenges youth face do not define the wholeness of their lived realities. This article focuses on applied theatre engagement, drawing on three youth participatory action research projects with Indigenous youth in three diverse contexts: in a school setting, in a youth offender jail, and with a community-based organization serving street-involved youth. It explores the significance of applied theatre approaches to research with Indigenous youth to avoid reproducing one-dimensional damage-centred narratives in favour of inspiring processes for survivance and resurgence. The discussion emphasizes the ways in which research can offer support for youth to become empowered and for others to see the youths’ wisdom and hope alongside the struggles that together shape their realities.
Keywords:
- applied theatre,
- youth participatory action research,
- Indigenous youth,
- resurgence,
- survivance
Résumé
Pour les jeunes Autochtones du Canada, cette époque a son lot de défis qui ne définissent pas pour autant l’ensemble de leurs réalités. Dans cet article, Diane Conrad s’intéresse au versant pratique de l’engagement théâtral en examinant trois projets de recherche-action participative auxquels ont participé des jeunes Autochtones dans trois contextes différents : en milieu scolaire, dans une prison pour jeunes délinquants et chez un organisme communautaire au service des jeunes de la rue. Elle explore l’importance d’une approche axée sur le théâtre appliqué pour les recherches menées auprès de jeunes Autochtones, faisant valoir qu’elle évite de reproduire des récits unidimensionnels centrés sur les dommages et permet d’ouvrir sur des processus inspirants pour la survie et la résurgence. Conrad met l’accent sur les façons dont la recherche peut aider les jeunes à s’autonomiser et amener les autres à voir la sagesse et l’espoir des jeunes en parallèle avec les luttes qui façonnent leurs réalités.
Mots-clés :
- théâtre appliqué,
- recherche-action participative pour les jeunes,
- jeunes Autochtones,
- résurgence,
- survivance
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Appendices
Biographical note
Diane Conrad is Professor of Drama/Theatre Education in the Department of Secondary Education at the University of Alberta. Her research over the past twenty years has involved applied theatre methods with marginalized youth in Alberta including many Indigenous youth. She is author of Athabasca’s Going Unmanned: An Ethnodrama about Incarcerated Youth (Sense, 2012) and co-editor of Creating Together: Participatory, Community-based and Collaborative Arts Practices and Scholarship across Canada (Wilfred Laurier University Press, 2015).
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