Monthly Archives: July 2025

CfP: TDPT Special Issue, 17.3: Re-envisioning the Theatre Laboratory and Training in the 21st Century

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Call for contributions, ideas, proposals and dialogue with the editors
Special Issue 17.3: Re-envisioning the Theatre Laboratory and Training in the 21st Century
to be published in September 2026

Guest Editors
Dr Patrick Campbell (Manchester Metropolitan University / p.campbell@mmu.ac.uk)
Professor Adam Ledger (Birmingham University / a.j.ledger@bham.ac.uk)
Dr Jane Turner (Independent Researcher) / j.turner.res@gmail.com

Overview 
This special edition of TDPT seeks to explore an expanded notion of theatre laboratory praxis, revisiting traditional notions of training in the light of ongoing sociopolitical, economic changes and practical challenges. In a post-pandemic world, rocked by war, financial crisis and the insidious rise of mediatised neoliberalism, the theatre laboratory community is currently in a state of flux: the time and energy taken to develop a laboratory practice increasingly seems both an anachronism and a financial and logistic impossibility for many. Thus, we wish to interrogate the theatre laboratory as an historical notion, and in terms of its  contemporary valency as both a paradigm within the performing arts and a transnational community of group theatre practitioners united by a shared set of values and an ethics of practice. 

This issue will examine contemporary theatre laboratory practices from a range of diverse, situated perspectives, drawing on the experiences of artists, scholars and practitioner researchers from diverse geopolitical contexts. Contributors will come from a wide range of performance disciplines such as actor training; theatre; critical pedagogy; opera; studio practice; circus; and dance.

A key question is the extent to which organisations that were formally recognised as theatre laboratories are, were or have become what might be described as ‘cultures of practice’ or  ‘communities of practice’? Our concern here is to explore what is meant by an expanded notion of training/practice, especially in contemporary terms. Whereas training has traditionally been considered an introspective praxis, focussing on the individual body and/or the body of the group, an expanded laboratory might be identified as one that faces outwards. Following tenets such as those described as ‘cultural action’ (from Freire, 1970), training may be a space that is able to shift continually according to the needs of communities and groups of spectators. 

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Training Grounds — Special Callout: ‘Training and… Politics’

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Calling all colleagues involved in performer training!

As many of you know, every issue of Theatre, Dance and Performance Training contains a ‘Training Grounds’ section, inviting submissions that allow us to articulate our practices in a range of alternative and exploratory formats (detailed below).

For our next issue, we invite Training Grounds submissions that respond to the theme: Training and Politics. We are interested in both (capital P) Politics and the more broadly political including areas that might consider world politics, institutional politics, or social politics.

We welcome a range of responses to the theme, including but not limited to:

  • The influence of historical or contemporary Political figures, movements, or ideologies on specific training practices, including where these influences might have been forgotten, hidden or ignored through the passage of time
  • Explorations of covert training practices and the risks of training under specific regimes or in societal contexts
  • Training and institutional politics (whether state-funded or private institutions) including in schools, conservatoires, companies and wider industrial structures
  • Training as a process or act of  resistance, liberation, or reconciliation (including conflict resolution)
  • Training and Political/political narratives, including: training as (a resistance to) propaganda; the idea, nature, function or impact of hidden curricula; training and “political correctness”
  • Training and the Politics of national identity and nationalism(s)
  • Training and the Politics of cultural identity, including the preservation and enactment of cultural heritage and the ideology that underpins this
  • The role of critical pedagogy and/or training for politically-engaged or socially-engaged practice
  • Training and international mobility, including trainings for and with refugees; trainings that facilitate global travel, relocation and/or exchange; or trainings and visa/migration processes
  • Training and oppressive/anti-oppressive practices

Here are short outlines of our three main Training Grounds formats for submissions:

Format 1:    Postcard on ‘Training and Politics’

Our postcards are short responses (120-150 words) on a given theme, giving a glimpse into your training world. You are free to play with the layout and formatting.

Format 2:   Speaking Image on ‘Training and Politics’

  • Choose a training image – photo, drawing, diagram etc., your own, or someone else’s (with permission).
  • Offer an analysis of what the image conveys that might not be obvious at first glance. Up to 300 words.

Format 3:   Essai on ‘Training and Politics’

An Essai takes its cue from the original French,  ‘to test, to trial, to try out’. An essai is a place where (or a means by which) you can explore an idea that is forming. Perhaps it is the seed of an idea that would benefit from being tested in writing, perhaps you have developed some ideas but they are not at the scope or depth of a formal journal article, perhaps it is a provocation or reflection that doesn’t fit the article format.

An Essai doesn’t have to conform to established academic protocols; we wouldn’t, for example, expect references or citations, though there may be one or two. An essai doesn’t have to be a single linear piece of writing, though it should collect around a single topic pertinent to training. An essai should draw the reader into the idea, but does not have to answer all their questions.

Length: 750-1,500 words

All of these formats are created for the joy of exchanging with colleagues about the work that we love — so please get in touch!

Deadlines:

Please send expressions of interest or rough drafts by 22nd September to Zoë Glen (zoeelizabethglen@gmail.com) and Thomas Wilson (thomas.wilson@bruford.ac.uk)

Edits and revisions:1st October – 17th November

Final submissions are due by 24th November.

TDPT Special Issue, Training for Movement, Physical Activity and Health, 16.2, Now Published

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From the editorial (available in full at the link below)…

Physical inactivity is increasingly being linked to chronic health conditions and all-cause mortality. The Lancet Global Series on physical activity has emphasised the need to take inactivity seriously and called on a diverse range of sectors to take bold and innovative action on tackling physical inactivity (Das and Horton Citation2016). However, despite a growing global interest in physical activity promotion, the varieties of movement and physical activity experienced by those who participate in performing arts training are rarely seriously considered in public health policy. The UK 2017 All Parliamentary Report, Creative Health: The Arts for Health and Wellbeing, mentions physical activity only four times within ninety-nine pages – referencing participation in dance and music (All Party Parliamentary Group on Arts Health and Wellbeing Citation2017). Similarly, none of the proposed strategic actions in the World Health Organisation’s Global Action Plan on Physical Activity mention the potential and existing roles that arts and cultural activities play in promoting and facilitating physical activity (WHO Citation2018).

We proposed this Special Issue of Theatre Dance and Performance Training in response to this apparent gap in policy, recognising the ways in which knowledge and practices from the arts might be used to expand and problematise biomedical paradigms of health and wellbeing. Our intention was to provide a context for contributors to analyse and articulate how training and participation in theatre, dance and performance provides important opportunities for promoting and facilitating movement, physical activity and health. We were fortunate to receive a diverse range of submissions exploring contemporary and historical examples of practice from professional performer training, participatory arts and continuing education. The contributions illustrate the breadth of thinking, research and practice that is happening at the intersection of performer training and health…

— The Editors

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