Emancipating Voice: the role of Drama in supporting the mental health and wellbeing of young people in a secondary school setting

Abstract

The aims of this arts-based research study are to examine how the mental health and wellbeing of young people in a secondary school setting is supported through a Drama curriculum, using performance poetry, found poetry and verbatim theatre as data. The participants were observed engaging in workshops in which the critical pedagogical approach of Open Space Learning (OSL) was applied. This pedagogy enables a shift in power between the teacher and the learner, encouraging democratic, explorative, and creative learning. The study was structured through an arts-based methodology, using a triangulation of data through dramaturgical approaches, framing the data through performance poetry, found poetry and Verbatim Theatre to explore the experiences of a sample of Year 9 and Year 10 Performing Arts students. Observation of their creative practice in Spoken Word and Verbatim Theatre workshops, and the found poetry crafted collaboratively from semi-structured interviews generated the data, with an analysis of the emerging themes from their creative practice. The constraints of curriculum planning in educational policies and Bourdieu’s theories of habitus, capital and symbolic violence were considered. This is supported with arguments for a more inclusive curriculum in secondary education by acknowledging the value of Drama in supporting students with their mental health and wellbeing at a time when the Arts are being marginalised in curriculum provision, particularly in state schools in areas of high unemployment and socio-economic depravation. This approach explores the impact of locality on the aspirations of the participants, in how the extent to which their view of the world is shaped by a gradual internalisation and acceptance of local historical influences which may subsequently have a subordinating and coercive effect within seemingly prescribed or accepted forms of habitus. The research focuses on two key areas, specifically, Drama as a subject and its value as an aspirational art form, and the mental health and wellbeing of students in a secondary school setting. Both key aspects of the research seek to investigate through an arts-based research methodology, the extent to which habitus and capital may shape the mental health and wellbeing of the students, and how the inclusion of Drama in the secondary school curriculum supports the social and academic development of young people.