Expanding Global Understanding Through the Theatre Arts

Authors

  • Patch Lee Clark East Carolina Univsersity - School of Theatre and Dance

Abstract

The School of Theatre and Dance in the College of Fine Arts and Communication at East Carolina University (ECU) collaborated with Universidad San Ignacio De Loyola (USIL) in Lima, Peru gathering children's stories,  folktales, fables and myths which were then transformed into theatre performances for  school children, teachers and families across Eastern North Carolina.  In 2009, the collected stories were used in an original children's musical,  All Aboard South America! produced at ECU and the Turnage Theater in Washington, N.C.  The value of sharing the dramatization of folktales, fables, and myths gathered in the Global Classroom with intergenerational audiences across the state of North Carolina served not only to expand the educational experience of all participants, but also broaden audience exposure to the artistic interpretation of collective tales indigenous to South America.  The exchange between theatre students enrolled in Youth Theatre I at ECU and students enrolled at USIL and the subsequent development of a children's theatre musical is the focus of this article.


Author Biography

Patch Lee Clark, East Carolina Univsersity - School of Theatre and Dance

Patricia “Patch” Clark is an Associate Professor and Coordinator of the Theatre Education and Theatre for Youth programs in the School of Theatre and Dance at  East Carolina University.  She has appeared in numerous ECU/Loessin Playhouse and ECU/Loessin Summer Theatre productions  including  Grease, My Fair Lady,   Inherit the Wind, A Doll’s House, Misalliance, Our Town, The Sound of Music, Oklahoma, A View from the Bridge, Crazy for You,  Yerma,   Grapes of Wrath,  The Time of Your Life, Footloose and, most recently, in Arsenic and Old Lace at the Turnage Theatre in Washington, N.C.

  She directed the Off-Broadway premiere production of Katmandu at the John Houseman Studio Theatre in July of 2001 and  is the author of Intergenerational Arts in the Nursing Home (Greenwood Press, 1991) and co-author of Seniors on Stage (Praeger Press, 1985.)  She also serves as the director for ECU’s Storybook Theatre for children and youth.   Original productions for Storybook Theatre include Tales From Around The World, My Hero…Reaching for the Stars,  All Aboard America!  Other Storybook Theatre productions include the Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe, Jungle Book, and Willy Wonka.   She has also taught in the public schools in Virginia and at the Virginia Governor’s School for the Visual and Performing Arts at the University of Richmond.

Published

2012-04-19

Issue

Vol. 2, No. 1, April 2012

Section

General-NoTitle

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