Evoking Teachers' Experience Through Inquiry Theater: Implications and Questions for the Study of Teachers' Lives and Careers

• In Event: Ethnographies and Ethnodramas: Moving Methodologies Toward Social Justice

Abstract

This paper discusses the implications of a long running ethnodramatic project for the study of teachers' lives and careers. I briefly describe the more than 80 hours of stories I collected from teachers in Chicago and then discuss the process I used to dramatize these data. In order to communicate the "live creature" (Dewey, 1934) produced by the performances, I present a photo history of two of my shows. Because ethnodrama exists to produce dialogue rather than answers, I provide a set of questions about what the work implies for the study of teachers' lives and experiences.

Author

• Charles F. Vanover, University of South Florida, St. Petersburg