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Abstract
This address was given as the final-day keynote of the Sixth International Drama in Education Research Institute (IDIERI) in Sydney, 2009. Using the Institute's title as his theme, O'Toole briefly surveys the growth of drama education research of the last two decades, and the changing landscape of practice and research. He then conducts an informal meta-analysis of the abstracts of all the papers submitted and accepted for the Institute. These are analysed in terms of what inferences can be made about the state of drama education research. Five analysis categories are investigated: the abstracts as phenomena; base-line data and research characteristics which the abstracts reveal; the learning content of the papers; the basic dimensions of drama education; and the methodologies used. There is some discussion of key gaps and omissions, based on a UK/Australian literature review of arts partnerships research. Finally, the paper raises, non-propositionally, the question of the identity of drama education research and researchers. Who are we and how are we perceived?
Notes
1. These may be found on http://www.idieri2009.org/ > program > downloadPDFoffinalprogram > pp31–119.
2. I do not intend to name the authors, as this paper makes personal evaluative judgements of aspects of the abstracts, some critical. Readers who wish to inspect the abstracts in detail for verification or evaluation of my comments, or any other aspects of this informal research report, may do so from the full IDIERI programme (see Note 1).
The image on the first page of this article (I, meta-fellow on the stair) is reproduced with kind permission from the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, © 2009.