by Nic Bennett
What have you been told you should do to protect the environment or to solve the climate crisis? Take a moment, and think about three (or more) things.
1 ______________________________
2 ______________________________
3 ______________________________
When we asked young people in Austin, Texas, they listed things like:
- Reduce, Reuse, Recycle!
- Don’t use plastic straws!
- Don’t eat meat!
- Use public transportation!
- Get an electric car.
- Planet a tree!
- Terraform Mars!
But if you take a look at the messages you listed and the ones we did, how many
- blame the individual?
- rely on shallow buzzwords?
- rely on shame/blame/fear?
- leave communities behind?
Most youth experience distress around the climate crisis. But mainstream environmental messages ignore youth concerns, place blame on individuals, and suggest techno-fixes rather than addressing root causes. We conduct research-based theatre projects with young people in Austin, TX to challenge these mainstream environmental messages.
We are supported by funding from the Green Fund and previously from Planet Texas 2050. Because of this funding, we were able to have an eco-emotions-aware counselor on staff for our rehearsals, performances, and one-on-one meetings.
We used Theatre of the Oppressed techniques during a semester of rehearsals and three public performances to explore our struggles with the climate crisis. Theatre of the Oppressed is a form of interactive theatre used in activism. It was developed by Augusto Boal and influenced by Paulo Freire’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed. Instead of having a stage where actors perform for an audience, Theatre of the Oppressed gets the audience involved in creating the performance. Because of how participatory this art form is, we speculated that it might support young people in uncovering their own narratives about the climate crisis.
Participants make an image of their struggles with the environmental crisis.
The main technique we used is called Cops in the Head, where we deal with external voices of oppression that have taken up residence in our heads. Through this exercise, we are interested in learning to recognize the environmental messages that are not our own and to handle them in healthier ways.
We used these techniques to pause, slow down, and embody the available agency already present within a single moment. The audience would jump in and intervene with our struggles with the “Cops in Our Head” to try to make healthier decisions when faced with the “cops” characters. These interventions revealed our own counternarratives to mainstream environmental messages.
We are still analyzing data from this project (surveys, focus group interviews, and observations), but three main themes are emerging so far (1) Embracing Entanglement, (2) Bridging Across Difference, and (3) Accepting Radical Responsibility.
Embracing Entanglement: Early in the process, we used lots of intellectual, binary “purity” narratives, but as we worked together, we began to see this struggle as more complex and messy. We began to see how we are implicated in the crisis.
Bridging Across Difference: The environmental crisis touches upon so many parts of our lives, and bridging ideological and generational divides often came up thematically in our work together.
Accepting Radical Responsibility: Early in the process, we located the problem somewhere “out there,” but as we worked together, we started to see ourselves located within structures of oppression but still with our own agency and responsibility.
I feel that at the beginning of this project I was more numb about climate change. Now, it’s not like I suddenly see that I can magically solve climate change, but I do have methods to better communicate about it, and feel more inspired to take action.
Cast member
Why use the arts in research about climate change? Arts-based data allows us to uncover representations beyond what language allows, which might get closer to participants’ emotional and lived experiences. While science-based climate change work starts with a question and looks for an answer, arts-based studies can uncover the questions we did not even know to ask. That is, while science often seeks to reduce uncertainty, arts-based research often seeks to disorient and disrupt.
This complements existing climate change research by asking whether we should only be searching for solutions to the climate crisis. In Theatre of the Oppressed, we often do not find solutions–but we do uncover insights. Our theatre-based research embraces a post-activist lens that troubles “solutions” to crises–instead exploring the vaster, kin-making possibilities that crisis can teach us.
Nic Bennett researches inclusive science communication in the Ph.D. program at The Stan Richards School of Advertising and Public Relations at The University of Texas. Their work is at the intersection of science communication, applied theater, and social justice. Before this, they researched climate change conservation biology while earning their Masters in Ecology, Evolution, and Behavior from The University of Texas. They are also an improv performer, director, and technical designer and have won three Biden Payne awards and an Austin Chronicle Critics Table Award. You can find them at http://stemprov.org (contact info here).