Public performance and democratic practice

• In Event: VIRTUAL HYBRID PANEL: The popular turn in global citizenship education: Youth voices from four continents

Proposal

Out-of-school contexts which shape civic education for conflict-affected youth are understudied in the West African context (Quaynor, 2015). Drawing from Liberian youth theatre artists, this ethnography uses a performance studies approach which is dialogical in practice with a strong pedagogical element, requiring participants to “collect information, the imagination to act, think and feel as someone else and the courage to encounter alternatives; the process is open and ongoing” (Conquergood, 1985). It is through the minutiae of day-to-day life that young people encounter and respond to a host of value-laden messages and expectations about how ideal citizens should behave, respond to their government, and situate themselves in a democratic society. With the proliferation of NGOs in Liberia since the end of the war and the long duration of these programs, my project seeks to understand how international perceptions of Liberian youth as victims has impacted the way in which youth self-identify and self-stage in their attempts to live better lives and pursue their future aspirations (Bungu, 2019). International donor and governmental organizations have the funding and influential power to shape national interventions and policies in development contexts (Ferguson, 2004). However, determining these national priorities on youth based on their current circumstances rather than including their values and aspirations may lead to cycles of young people learning to portray themselves as perpetual victims (Utas, 2011). As a result, NGOs continue to formulate policies and fund programs that may not meet their needs for a brighter future (Durham & Cole, 2007; Cheney, 2010; Hörschelmann & Colls, 2009).

This study engages junior and senior high school-aged community theatre artists who spent at least two years writing and performing plays about issues they collectively identified as having the greatest impact on young people in Liberia, drawing from their own experiences and broader discourses on youth that impact their perceptions about themselves as emerging citizens. I examine their work as stage actors to understand the ways in which their performances carry into everyday lived experiences navigating systems and structures of belonging, demanding services and benefits tied to rights based frameworks and making judgements about their own responsibilities and the responsibilities of the institutions, both state and nongovernmental, which impact their quality of life and options for the future (Lee & Isin, 2014). The project focuses on youth voice and gesture, highlighting the “multiplicity of responses and interpretations of theater performances” which reveal “the relationship between performance and nationalism… and struggles for power between and among citizens and states” (Covington-Ward, 2015, p. 23). This paper demonstrates ways in which performing arts create possibilities for collective work among youth, and how artists’ projects are made possible or constrained by the development agendas of international nongovernmental organizations and their attending global discourses which impact youth perceptions of their own civic and social priorities.

Author

• Jasmine L. Blanks Jones, University of Pennsylvania