Scenario: A Journal for Performative Teaching, Learning, Research. Vol. XI Issue 01

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    Foreword
    (Department of German, University College Cork, 2017) Piazzoli, Erika; Donnery, Eucharia; Piazzoli, Erika; Donnery, Eucharia
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    Inhabiting scopus: Navigating modern controversies with performative approaches in a public speaking course
    (Department of German, University College Cork, 2017) Sorensen, Lane; Piazzoli, Erika; Donnery, Eucharia
    COLL-P155 is an undergraduate public speaking course in which students give speeches on modern public controversies such as capital punishment, abortion, immigration, etc; in other words, issues for which many might hold a definite – at times inflexible – bias. In order to mitigate such biases, the concept of scopus, moving out of one perspective to inhabit another (Arthos, 2017a: Lecture 11), is situated in the goals of the speech assignments and combined with the theoretical and practical benefits of drama pedagogy as illustrated by Even (2008). Following a description of the speech assignments is a pedagogical reflection of activities that combine scopus and drama pedagogy to get students up and out of their seats in order to act out frames of mind that might embody perspectives drastically different from their own. From encouraging ad-hominem attacks in fictitious arguments about favorite foods to highlight the counterproductive and harmful nature of alienating language, to acting out a Grimm’s fairytale from the villain’s perspective to encourage empathy with an unpopular position, the lessons of open-mindedness and civility emphasized in these performative activities can be transferred to discourse surrounding real-world controversies.
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    Presenting as performance: Painless practices for presentation in foreign languages
    (Department of German, University College Cork, 2017) Eikel-Pohen, Mona; Piazzoli, Erika; Donnery, Eucharia
    Presenting is a complex task for language learners. It requires them to acquire and read material, extract main points and express them in their own words in the target language, listen to other presenters and react appropriately with good questions and comments – and, of course, speak out loud while presenting. Language learners activate all these skills on a daily basis in the language classroom. However, speaking out loud in front of a group about one specific topic for an extended period of time is usually not part of the daily routine and therefore demands special attention, care, and action. This article models a sequence for preparing, planning, practicing, delivering, and evaluating presentations and briefly discusses the role of visual slides, but focuses on speaking exercises and explains how they strengthen the presenters both as language learners and as performers. Two theater theories form the backbone to these exercises: Konstantin Stanislavski’s “system”, and Keith Johnstone’s improvisation theater concept of status.The article describes each step of a practice sequence, including warm-up exercises, prompts for constructive peer feedback, and rubrics for (self-)evaluation, and reflects on the overall benefits of their inclusion in the language classroom.
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    A film documenting the international Scenario Forum Conference 2017
    (Department of German, University College Cork, 2017) Klich, Patricia; Klich, Maciek; Piazzoli, Erika; Donnery, Eucharia
    The film can be viewed on YouTube at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_J5uFayugUQ&feature=youtu.be.
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    Collaborators and hecklers: Performative pedagogy and interruptive processes
    (Department of German, University College Cork, 2017) Campbell, Lee; Piazzoli, Erika; Donnery, Eucharia
    Arguing for the positive disruptive nature of interruption, this paper concentrates on my current performative and pedagogic usage of interruption within my teaching as the means to achieve three aims: 1) develop aspects of practice discussed in my doctoral thesis ‘Tactics of Interruption: Provoking Participation in Performance Art’ (Campbell 2016) related to the focused usage of interruptive processes in contemporary art practice (Arlander 2009: 2) provide students with direct experience of how interruption may command immediate reaction and force collaborative means of working, i.e. collective survival tactics to deal with interruption; and 3) theorise, articulate and demonstrate how interruption relates to critical reflection (on the part of both student and teacher), extending the ideas of Maggi Savin-Baden (2007) to propose interruption as reflection. To achieve these aims, the paper discusses how I have implemented interruption into learning activity design and evidences how I have created activities that aim to help students understand collaborative learning in cross-disciplinary projects through an effective use of realia (interruption is part of real life). I discuss one first year teaching seminar at Loughborough University in March 2015 (and subsequent related iterations) combining performance, fine art and collaboration methodologies where students directly engaged in a range of activities not displaced from their own life experiences; there was heavy student engagement in digital technologies, and interruption. The main outcomes of the teaching session support and go beyond the aims by relating to: a) experiential learning related to the interplay between ‘collaboration’ and ‘interruption’; b) performative pedagogy and inclusion; c) the interplay between teaching, liveness and interruption; and d) performative pedagogy and the exchange of power relation.