The Dance of Art and Understanding: Theatre methodologies in community-focused research – March 4, 2025

Session Description

The Centre for Community Partnerships (CCP) and the Centre for Research and Innovation Support (CRIS) invite you to join us for the next session in the Community Engaged Research Discussion Club. This session will focus on the topic: theatre methodologies in community-focused research. Professor Kathleen Gallagher and Playwright / Director Andrew Kushnir will tell the story of building a long-standing collaboration through two projects: “Youth, Theatre, Radical Hope and the Ethical Imaginary: an intercultural investigation of drama pedagogy, performance and civic engagement (2014-2019)" and “Global Youth (Digital) Citizen-Artists and their Publics: Performing for Socio-Ecological Justice (2019-2026)”. They invite participants to explore with them the following questions: 

• Why the arts--and specifically theatre--as a methodology in community-focused research?  
• How does an inquiry led by art-making curiosity change how a researcher understands what they are researching?  
• How do we understand “community” across geographies and boundaries, including boundaries between inside and outside academia?  
• How does community-building transpire in and through global intercultural exchange in service of research?  
• How is pedagogy conferred in the process of community-focused research?  
• This series is for researchers with an interest in deepening their theoretical and practical understanding of community engaged research to connect with, and learn together from, colleagues from across the tri-campus in order to strengthen both societal and scholarly impact.   

Moderator: Alison Mountz, Professor, Department of Geography and Planning, Interim Vice-Principal Research & Innovation, UTSC 
Panelists: 

• Kathleen Gallagher, Distinguished Professor, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, and Director, Centre for Drama, Theatre & Performance Studies
• Andrew Kushnir, Artistic Director, Project: Humanity and Award-Winning Playwright, Director, and Activist.