Elena and Emma do not know each other but it is as if they spoke the same language.
They share the desire to learn and to discover the connections, going to the bottom of their intuitions.
But learning requires teachers to follow and constant questions.
This is what I saw these two young university students doing, as they devoted a lot of time to investigating and sharing the contents of the Re.Sto.Re project, exploring and highlighting the fact that not only does the theater in the social produce well-being in all human territories, but it is a real methodological opportunity, capable of generating social impact.
Let’s hear from their voice.
ELENA GALEOTTI Recognizing the Other as You: Creating the Expressive Space of the Word and the Theater”, Degree Thesis at the Department of Education, Roma Tre
“Each of us needs the other to express themselves, and it is in the relationship that we realize that it is our constituent”, since these are the words of Edda Ducci, philosopher of education, from whom I started writing my thesis “Recognizing the Other as a You: Creating the Expressive Space of the Word and the Theater”, at the Department of Education of Roma Tre. What I have tried to bring out from my research is that we all need a figure who stands as a You in our journey so that each of us can know ourselves, grow, improve, on the basis of a full, conscious listening, the result of a search guided by the help of someone who stands beside us.
The social theatre dimension, together with the educational one, constitute an important space of human communicability, both forms of knowledge of the world, instruments of change and transformation of human being, ways of entering into relationships.
What I learned from the Re.Sto.Re project is that theater allows us to build new scenarios, infinite possibilities to be and to be there, for us and for each other, in an environment that focuses on relationships and trust, communication and understanding.
Thanks to it, I was able to recognize the importance of the role played by a Social Theater Operator who, playing the role of an educator, helps to re-establish contact with oneself and the other from oneself, perhaps lost over time, regaining trust, meaning of responsibility, vision and listening to the other through the power of communication and exchange, regardless of any form of prejudice. A moment in which we return to being and feeling important, not only for ourselves, but for the whole group, the whole community, as well as the main reason why we need a You to make sense to say I[1].
[1] Gilberto Scaramuzzo, In-tendere, L’umana sophia di Luigi Pirandello, Roma, Anicia, 2005
EMMA CAVEDAGHI The paradigm of consumption in pathological addictions: art as a tool for re-education, Degree Thesis at Professional Education, Università degli Studi, Brescia
The conference at the end of the “Re.Sto.Re Project”, that I attended, took shape through the testimonies of various professionals in the theatre, film, and arts.
The shared message conveyed the importance of looking forward, with a view to change and growth, highlighting the creativity that everyone, naturally, possesses. And the creativity, this mean of communication connecting reason and imagination, is a gift that shines its own light, and which is such even in those who contemplate it. We need to include while avoiding the risk of exclusion, creating a communal struggle directed toward the flourishing of a paideia that educates on feelings. Theatre is a humanly powerful tool, whose deep drama builds new languages, new levels of confrontation, questioning how to reflect oneself in others and looking for a common source of joy. This Art in its variety, in its being “high” and at the same time “accessible”, overcomes countless forms of degradation and repression. Each of us has a desire for love and acceptance, but in the ordinary we are confronted with a society that suppresses the defects, creating something as far from uniqueness as possible.
Art, however, such as life itself, is fallible, wrong, and fragile: giving the possibility of accepting failure is an obsolete act, but one that reconstitutes the attempt to be happy, the only one perhaps that, truly, unites all. Everything can be said about theatre, but not that it is fiction: it’s the soul of people speaking.