I hope you all had a great time at the Theatre of the World Festival. I want you to reflect back on the programs such as The Girl Who Lost Her Smile, Inside Story, Memoirs of a Woman, the Poetry and Prose of Naomi Shihab Nye etc. and tell us what you thought about the different cultural performances and your own personal experience. You don't have to respond to each question, these are just some ideas to get you thinking. Your response/insight on the festival should be at least a couple of sentences. Thanks!
1. Did the Theatre of the World Festival inspire/change your views on other cultures?
2. What were some things you learned or not thought about before at the festival?
3.What were your favorite activities there?
4.What were some elements that were utilized in the various plays you saw? (Ex. Music, Lights, Puppets etc)
5. How did the incorporation of Farsi in The Girl Who Lost her Smile and Arabic in Memoirs of a Woman add to the overall performance?
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ReplyDeleteRobin Goret
ReplyDeleteTheatre 315
1. The festival validated my views on other cultures and the role that theatre can play in bringing people together.
2. I had not thought about how parts of the Middle East were divided up by European nations (Britain, France, etc.) in what seems like an almost arbitrary fashion.
3. I enjoyed the performance artists on the steps in front of the Don Powell and the mural wall.
4. Puppets and Music
5. It felt very realistic and added to the depth of the performances to hear things in the native language.
Allison Aubrey
ReplyDeleteI liked how the festival focused on the Middle East, since the area is unknown to many. I enjoyed how Inside Story showed the complexity of ethnicity. It really opened my eyes to ethnic identity.
The puppet parade was a lot of fun. I enjoyed being silly among the rather serious plays.
I really enjoyed the entire festival especially because I know so little about the middle eastern culture. The puppet show was so much better than i'd expected it to be and my roommates and I even painted pictures and colored them with sand. It was fun once you gave into the sillyness. I like how some of the plays incorportated extra thigns like talking to the audience directly and dancing in the end. It all added to the overall theme of the festival. Overall I really likes it
ReplyDeleteI personally think it's wonderful to expose children to different cultures in a way that is entertaining to them. Children are so accepting of new things and we should take advantage of this to widen their horizons. I was going to take my niece to the festival but was not able to do so but I think she would have loved to watch plays in which Arabic or Farsi was featured. I also think that we live in a culture where we tend to think of the world as very American-centric, so it was nice to see that other cultures have fairy-tales - it's a good reminder of how diverse the world really is outside our own environment. I also know so little about Middle Eastern culture, so its always interesting to watch something that is not only entertaining, but gives you information and knowledge about new things.
ReplyDeleteBTW, for any who has not seen it yet, 1001 Grains of Sand is a very interesting play, also centered around the Middle East. I think you will all enjoy it.
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Megan Caudle
I really enjoyed The Girl Who Lost Her Smile. I thought it was perfect for young audiences and really held the attention of the audience. I also really like that it was not too long so it stayed enjoyable. And, of course, I loved the dancing at the end!
One of the activities I enjoyed was the face painting. I really liked how so many people stepped outside of their comfort zones and really got involved!
Amber Redmerski
ReplyDeleteI really enjoyed the festival and felt I learned a lot about middle eastern culture. i really liked how the entire festival was themed and had something for everyone to enjoy. The Puppet parade was a lot of fun and it was great seeing most of our class there.
The shows I saw really did a great job at showcasing Middle Eastern culture. the themes in Inside story and the girl who lost her smile were appropriate for elementary school students so I found those to be the most enjoyable. The festival was a lot of fun and extremely interesting.
Jose Llamas
ReplyDeleteI thought that each performance at the Festival provided an opportunity to learn about theater and story telling techniques, as well as a little bit about the Middle Eastern culture. I liked the simplicity of some of the stories, such as “The Girl Who Lost Her Smile,” because those stories help reach both young and old audiences. I enjoyed the performance of each story and I thought it was appropriate to include music and props combined with artistic movement and voice to create characters and the overall atmosphere of the plays. I agree with Robin’s comments about the incorporation of foreign sounds and language because that too added authenticity and originality to the entire piece.
I thought it was really interesting to see different cultures. It was something I had never really experienced before. My favorite activity was the face painting. It always reminds me of being a kid again. I enjoyed the music and the dancing in the plays. It was reaally interesting watching the elementary appropriate plays so I can apply them when I am a teacher.
ReplyDeleteCassie Radcliffe
I thought that the festival was great. I enjoyed the puppet parade, and the dances in the outside stage next to Don Powell. I liked that it focuses on one culture or theme, which this case was Middle East. I liked how all the lights and costumes helped the viewer relate to the plays and picture everything in their heads. This was my first time attending a festival and it sure won't be the last.
ReplyDeleteTona Reynoso
I thought it was very interesting how the play was completely done in another language, in jordanian/arabic. Unfortunately, I don't think it was as clear as they thought it was. You could see in their faces and actions the kinds of feelings that were trying to be expressed, but I think that words make it all the much more clear of what their point was.
ReplyDeleteI also thought the shoe thing was very interesting. Before Monday night, I did not know that having your foot raised or shoes are a sign of disrepect for Middle-Easterners. I am very curious to watch people and their foot placement now. Of course, as she was explaining this I felt very rude, because I had my feet up.
Although, I think they are doing a great think by spreading the knowledge of domestic voilence and the knowledge of Middle-Easterners, (that they are not all terrorists), I felt very uncomfortable when someone in front of me was speaking of her personal experience with an abusive relationship.
I also thought it was very cool how they integrated history and folk tales into a lot of the plays.
I really enjoyed the puppets and I can see myself attempting to use these kinds of puppets in the future for my own classroom.
Kimmie Spears
Did the Theatre of the World Festival inspire/change your views on other cultures?: Yes it did inspire new views of other cultures in me. The performance that did this was the one entitled Poetry in Prose. It was interesting to hear in the reading how it would be to come from The United States and move to a foreign country.
ReplyDeleteWhat were some things you learned or not thought about before at the festival?: Some things I had not thought of before the festival was the amount of different activities they were offering at the event. I was surprised by all the participation available for the young and the old. My impress was that it was only going to be performances, but when I got there, there were many activities to participate in.
What were your favorite activities there? My favorite thing at the festival was the food. I had some of the food closest to the Don Powell Theatre and it was delicious.
What were some elements that were utilized in the various plays you saw? (Ex. Music, Lights, Puppets etc) : One of the plays that I saw was “1001 Grains of sand”. In the play they utilized things as lighting, costume, sound effects, and many other elements.
How did the incorporation of Farsi in The Girl Who Lost her Smile and Arabic in Memoirs of a Woman add to the overall performance?: I believe that the use of other languages was very beneficial to the telling of the story. The incorporation of the languages or Farsi and Arabic made the performances “richer.”
Vanessa Grice
I enjoyed the cultural aspect of the festival. It was refreshing to see performers with different cultural backgrounds. My favorite show was "The Girl Who Lost Her Smile." I thought it was fun and interactive. It was neat how the performers taught us a Middle Eastern dance at the end of the show. I really enjoyed the dancing and costumes. It was very lively and kept me entertained the whole time. It would be cool if students other than those taking theatre classes experienced the festival as well!
ReplyDeleteKrissy Ettinger
( I accidentally posted this blog in the wrong spot at first, sorry!)
I really enjoyed the entire festival. I found it to be very enriching and especially enjoyed the puppet parade because it allowed everyone to participate, which is always a very good cultural and artistic experience. I thought that the stage set-up for 1001 Grains of Sand was phenomenal and I especially enjoyed the movement, lighting, and sound effects used to portray the movement of the hourglass.
ReplyDeleteAlthough I found Memoirs of a Women to be a very sad play, I am glad it ended with dancing...which I found to be very culturally enriching.
Overall, I thought the whole festival was a blast and enjoyed how cultural it was...and I especially appreciated how Inside story opened my eyes to a lot of cultural stereotypes and cleared up any confusion about these. In the future, I would like to see even more people attend this festival because I think that theatre is a very powerful form of art to educate our world with. And on closing note, I enjoyed the lady on the stage at the end who sang and wrapped up our day with four foreign words that reminded us to always keep what we had learned that day.
I really enjoyed the entire festival. I found it to be very enriching and especially enjoyed the puppet parade because it allowed everyone to participate, which is always a very good cultural and artistic experience. I thought that the stage set-up for 1001 Grains of Sand was phenomenal and I especially enjoyed the movement, lighting, and sound effects used to portray the movement of the hourglass.
ReplyDeleteAlthough I found Memoirs of a Women to be a very sad play, I am glad it ended with dancing...which I found to be very culturally enriching.
Overall, I thought the whole festival was a blast and enjoyed how cultural it was...and I especially appreciated how Inside story opened my eyes to a lot of cultural stereotypes and cleared up any confusion about these. In the future, I would like to see even more people attend this festival because I think that theatre is a very powerful form of art to educate our world with. And on closing note, I enjoyed the lady on the stage at the end who sang and wrapped up our day with four foreign words that reminded us to always keep what we had learned that day.
Brittany Blanscet
1. The festival did help me to have a better view on the cultures being displayed. It is really interesting because we have a certain way that the middle east is portrayed in our media, and it was nice to see it shown in a different way.
ReplyDelete2.One of the things that I learned from the festival was that there are many more similarities between our culture and thiers than I thought there were.
3. One of my favorite activities was the puppet parade. I thought it was going to be really humiliating, but we were all there from class and all just able to laugh at ourselves, that it was so much fun.
4. I thought that throughout most of the plays we saw there was this unifying element of music. Getting to hear the different ways that the music was used helped me to really feel more connected to the stories that were being told.
5. At first, I thought that I would have a really hard time getting myself to connect to the story in Memoirs of a Woman, learning that it was going to be performed in arabic, but as soon as the actual play started, I could feel the emotions being portrayed by the actors and even though I didn't understand what was being said, I did understand what was going on.
The Theatre of the World Festival changed my views on other cultures by enlightening me that although it is an entirely different culture then mine, there are still many things we can relate to. I found this during the excerpt reading that Robyn was involved in. What I learned about the festival is that even though I wasn't really sure what to expect I still enjoyed myself. One of the activities i enjoyed was the parade because it was a different type of parade then what I'm use to being involved in. Other parades I've participated in we had to concentrate on getting good scores, but this one was all about having fun, so it wa nice for a change.
ReplyDeleteI really enjoyed the festival. I liked how there were things going on outside as well as the performances inside. I think it was hard to choose which performances to attend, because some of them took place at the same time. I liked the girl who lost her smile, because I liked how at the end we learned how to do a dance. I love learning new things about other cultures. I liked all of the colors that were in each of the plays that I saw, I also think that the character's costumes further emphasized the cultures they were trying to portray. I am very glad I was given the opportunity to attend the festival. Kayla Del Casale
ReplyDeleteI'm not very technologically savy, so I decided to just post via a comment. I really enjoyed the festival. I liked how there were things going on outside as well as the performances inside. I think it was hard to choose which performances to attend, because some of them took place at the same time. I liked the girl who lost her smile, because I liked how at the end we learned how to do a dance. I love learning new things about other cultures. I liked all of the colors that were in each of the plays that I saw, I also think that the character's costumes further emphasized the cultures they were trying to portray. I am very glad I was given the opportunity to attend the festival. kayla delcasale
ReplyDelete