Objects with Objectives: a puppetry in applied drama research network

'Objects with Objectives' seeks to bring together academics and practitioners in a shared international exploration of the potential interplay between Applied Drama and Applied Puppetry. 'Puppetry' is used here to denote a range of performance techniques in which objects are manipulated directly or indirectly by human operators, and the project has been inspired by approaches where there is a close interaction between operator and puppet as in the puppets devised for the RNT production of 'Warhorse' by the Cape Town-based Handspring Puppet Company. Applied Drama is used here to denote a range of participatory drama techniques such as Augusto Boal's Theatre of the Oppressed, Playback Theatre and Theatre of Witness.

The network includes academics and practitioners from the UK and Ireland, South Africa, the United States and Australia.

Some members of the network have already experimented with combining these techniques. Others have an established expertise in one or the other. Members of the network, who have expertise in either or both applied drama and puppetry, will meet together in Cape Town, South Africa, in May 2017 as part of the 19th ASSITEJ World Congress to exchange skills and ideas and develop models for small-scale experimental projects that will combine puppetry and applied drama which they will deliver at their home base either singly or in interdisciplinary teams in the second half of 2017. Local projects may be based on workshops or small-scale performances and may be specifically designed for this programme or integrated with existing teaching or research.

Periodic video conferencing, involving some or all of the network will allow for the sharing of reports on work-in-progress and the continuous sharing of ideas, with the UK members reconvening as part of the TaPRA conference (Theatre and Performance Research Association) in September 2017 to share interim findings with the TaPRA Applied and Social Theatre Worming Group.

A smaller steering group made of network members will then reassemble at Queen's University, Belfast in January 2018, to review the findings of locally-based activities, agree a list of written outputs and prepare online resources for publication on the project Vlog as a training and teaching resource.

Impact is intrinsic to the work of this network, given its focus on applied drama and puppetry used in social contexts. From the outset the network's programme will directly contribute to the ASSITEJ World Congress and International Festival for Children and Young People in Cape Town in May 2017 by providing two days of events which up to 20 local and visiting artists and representatives of specific communities will attend. Some these places will also be available to the general public, subject to demand. Participants will gain a direct insight into the potential for using puppets and applied drama in their own communities with the groups with which they work. Contact details will be taken so that they can be sent links to online teaching and support materials when these become available.

ONLINE RESOURCES
Working examples of techniques combining Applied Drama and Applied Puppetry will be filmed during the Cape Town Symposium and included in a Vlog which will be updated at monthly intervals to share the work of the network with a list of drama facilitators and community leaders compiled by the network members from their own contacts.
Six five-minute "How To" guides will be filmed, edited and uploaded to Youtube following the final network meeting in January 2018, for teaching and training purposes. Links to these short films will be circulated to the list of relevant drama facilitators and community leaders by network members accompanied by brief written explanations.

DISSEMINATION THROUGH EMBODIED PRACTICE
All members of the network, either through public-facing arts programmes, or practice-based research that engages with specific non-academic groups, are fully engaged with specific communities and it is expected that the work of the network will enhance the impact of this work to the benefit of those members of the wider public with which they work. These will include training workshops for applied drama facilitators and community leaders in the UK, Ireland, South Africa, Australia, and the United States.