Applied Drama

Did You Know?

• Applied drama can be either scripted or unscripted.
• Some practitioners focus primarily on improvisation, while others introduce scripted plays, devised performances, or indigenous forms of cultural performance.
• These practices are sometimes combined with new forms of digital communication.

Fields associated with applied drama

Playback Theater involves audience or group members telling stories from their own lives, which are then enacted by improvising actors; it can be used alongside narrative therapy. Drama in healthcare is created in medical contexts, often with rehabilitation as its goal, and aims to educate, engage, and stimulate healing in medical professionals, patients, and the public. It is used to inform people about health issues such as healthy eating, grief and loss, exercise, and sexual assault prevention, for example through role-playing health ailments to train healthcare professionals or performing plays focused on primary prevention. Drama therapy applies applied drama techniques to promote personal growth and mental health, rooted in clinical practice and facilitated by licensed clinicians to stimulate language, cognitive development, and build resilience. Theater for development uses these techniques to facilitate development in less developed countries. Drama in education helps students develop an understanding of themselves and others; Kathleen Gallagher has noted that there is no correct pedagogical model for drama education, and that in theatre pedagogy participants make manifest their own subjectivities through character and play.