Phakama

An international arts organisation and network engaging with music, dance, theatre and visual art, Phakama creates adventurous, site-responsive performances with large groups of people from diverse backgrounds. With contributions from participants, artists, academics and cultural commentators from India, Ireland, South Africa, the UK and USA, this book features case studies, interviews and articles covering two decades of practice. At the heart of the book is a selection of carefully explained and beautifully illustrated exercises which will enable Phakama's methodology to be used by organisations and practitioners working with young people internationally. Phakama is a Xhosa and Zulu word for stand up, arise, empower yourself. With a focus on collaborative, non-hierarchical performance making, Phakama invites cultural sharing and critical engagement with the world we live in. As well as engaging with political and critical concerns about contemporary theatre and performance, the book offers unique approaches to devising theatre, applied and social theatre, intercultural performance practices and pedagogic models of collaboration and cultural leadership.

Across the country, schools that integrate the arts into the fabric of the school day and across the curriculum defy educational odds and expectations. These schools demonstrate that the arts are profoundly cognitive and engaging and that arts integration is a strategy within the reach of schools even in the poorest communities. Putting the Arts in the Picture makes a powerful and original argument for placing the arts at the center of educational renewal. The authors investigate the success of arts integrated schools and the programs that have supported them, and explain why arts integration has such cognitive power. Putting the Arts in the Picture places arts integration within the long arc of efforts to realize the democratic promise of public education and examines how other nations have mobilized the arts to focus young people's need to learn and grow. Throughout, the authors suggest practical strategies--for educators, policymakers, school reformers, philanthropists, and parents--that can make arts integration broadly available to the children who need it most.