Theatre of the Oppressed is a form of theatre credited to the Brazilian theatre practitioner and political activist Augusto Boal. He was influenced by the work of educator Paulo Freire. Boal created a form of theatre where the people become active and they explore, show, analyze and transform the reality in which they are living, and, thus, become “spect-actors” (not subjects, but objects of the social forces acting on them).

The goal of the workshop is to explore the ways in which theatre serves a as means of promoting social and political change. Theater of the Oppressed provides tools for people to explore collective and personal struggles, analyze their history and present circumstances and experiment with inventing/co-creating a new future together through theater. Finally, our movements need to be more strategic and community-led! Theater of the Oppressed offers arts-based strategy-developing exercises that foster collaboration and community-led engagement.

During the training the participants will have the chance to:
• Discover tools/approaches that allow to us recognize and embrace diversity of clashing views and its beauty and to transform it into a public format of the political (civil) dialogue.
• Learn about ways to train citizens about democracy and dialogue
• Co-create strategy for a civic initiative/movement
• Explore ways to train people to implement ideas, speak with population and focus on specific challenges and solutions in order to involve more citizens in the civic initiative/movement.

Participation requirements:
1. Presence throughout whole duration of the seminar (18th – 20th of September, from 9:30 to 17:30).
2. Working level of English (volunteer translation will be provided upon request).
3. Prior involvement in the OccupyGuguță initiative or other movements or campaigns is encourgaed, but not required.
4. Only registered participants will be accepted. Please find the registration form here  Registration Deadline: 13 September, 2018
5. Participation is free of charge, but donations (both financial and in-kind) are welcome and appreciated.
6. No previous theatre experience is required.

Joker’s/facilitator’s short bio:
Hjalmar Jorge Joffre-Eichhorn is a German-Bolivian theatre maker, facilitator, script writer and director who uses different forms of interactive, participatory theatre such as Theatre of the Oppressed and Playback Theatre to work with communities in conflict and create possibilities for bottom-up dialogue and a search for grassroots solutions. He holds a Master’s in Peace and Development Studies from Jaume I, Spain, a Master’s in Educational Management from the University of Western Australia, Australia and a Bachelor’s in Psychology and International Relations from Bond University, Australia. Hjalmar has carried out community-based theatre initiatives in more than thirty countries on all five continents including in (post-) conflict environments such as Afghanistan, Central African Republic, Kenya, Kyrgyzstan, Maldives, Northern Ireland, Rwanda, Sierra Leone, Tajikistan, Thailand, Timor Leste, Ukraine and Yemen. In 2013 he published ‘Wenn die Burka plötzlich fliegt-Einblicke in die Arbeit mit dem Theater der Unterdrückten in Afghanistan’, a book in German language reflecting about his experiences working with theatre in Afghanistan. Some of his writing has been published in Bolivia, Spain, Germany and the USA.