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Theatre of the Oppressed
Theatre of the Oppressed is an effective tool for creating change in the world. It is
a theatrical form that was developed and elaborated by Brazilian director Augusto Boal.
The creation of this theatrical form is mainly based on the interaction of the audience
and performers, this is why it allows the audience to work as a “spect-actor” and
collaborate with the performers. The Theatre of the Oppressed is also a rehearsal
theatre for people who wish to fight against oppression in their life.
Augusto Boal uses theatre as a tool to promote social and political change, it
usually begins with a scene where there are problems that can occur in real life
situation, for example gender inequality, child abuse, or even just difficulties of
communicating with others. By having the “spect-actors”, they will be responsible for
developing ideas to solve those problems that occur in the performances, and they will
be invited to act as characters inside the play to solve the problem, they are also allowed
to stop the performance whenever they see a solution.
By having this theatrical form, it is not difficult to create change in the world. As
mentioned above, it is a rehearsal theatre or people who wish to fight against
oppression in their life, therefore they can seek solution from the performance of
solving their everyday problems. Nowadays there are many different problems that
need to be solved and changed, by having Theatre of the Oppressed, people can observe
the different solutions to solve and if they apply it in everyday situations, they can
create a change. The Theatre of the Oppressed is not just a rehearsal theatre, it also lets
the both the audience and the performers to reflect on their lives, about their everyday
problems that need to be solved.
As more and more people know about the Theatre of the Oppressed, Augusto
Boal’s creation of this theatrical form makes him being seen as a threat, because his
teachings’ were controversial, and therefore he was once kidnapped, arrested, tortured
and exiled to Argentina. This shows the effectiveness of his theatrical forms, if it was not
as effective, he would not be seen as a threat. Therefore, if Theatre of the Oppressed is
promoted to more places, people can reflect on their lives and have the motivation to
change the world.
Apart from the most common type of Theatre of the Oppressed, Forum theatre,
there are more different types to it, and the Invisible theatre is another way to allow
“audience” to participate in the performance. To be exact, the performance is not really
a performance, since it is designed to let people see it as a real event and see how people
around will react to it. Invisible theatre is usually set in a place where people do not
expect oppression to happen, for example the shopping mall or on the streets.
Having the different types of Theatre of the Oppressed, as the performers and the
audience, they can learn how to deal with oppression that are happening,, or they can
try preventing the oppression to happen. However, to create the change, it requires the
participation of the audience, if the audience participate in the performance, they can
help promoting social or even political change, hoping to change our world into a better
world.
Bibliography
"Augusto Boal." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, n.d. Web. 25 Feb. 2016.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Augusto_Boal>.
"AUGUSTO BOAL & THE THEATRE OF OPPRESSED." Brech Forum Archive, n.d. Web. 26
Feb. 2016. <https://brechtforum.org/abouttop>.
"Theatre of the Oppressed." N.p., n.d. Web. 26 Feb. 2016.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theatre_of_the_Oppressed>.
"Theatre of Change (About Theatre of the Oppressed)." The Forum Project. N.p., n.d.
Web. 26 Feb. 2016. <http://theforumproject.org/whatisto/what-is-theatre-ofthe-oppressed/>.