Establishing a moral discourse: a limiting outcome, or an opportunity for tactical action? An exploration of alternative perspectives on health education in South Africa

Abstract

Stemming from a viewpoint that my applied theatre practice should include both a dialogical element and an opportunity to take creative risks, this article explores how creative risk-taking can lead to seemingly repressive outcomes for the participants. Examining two moments of practice, which occurred during sexual health communication projects in the Nyanga township, this article examines how and why these particular outcomes emerged, and explains my concerns over this outcome and its apparent inherent contradiction with the notion that applied theatre practice is based on creating a dialogue. Yet the suspicion that something else was occurring in these moments leads to the proposal of another viewpoint, where by situating the practice and the resulting outcomes within both a healthcare framework and one of tactical action, alternative explanations become apparent: that the individuals' actions were tactical acts of protection and resistance in an environment where life is not always ‘tolerable’.

Keywords:

• applied theatre
• sexual health
• risk-taking
• South Africa

Acknowledgements

Part of this research was funded by a Wingate Scholarship from the Harold Hyam Wingate Foundation and the School of Arts, Histories and Cultures at the University of Manchester. The author would like to thank both organisations for their support.

Notes

1. See www.etafenitrust.org.

2. The audience members’ names have been changed for reasons of confidentiality, however, the participants’ names have not, with their agreement as co-creators of this knowledge and research.

3. South Africa is infamous for horror stories about crime and violence and despite concerns over the accuracy of the 2008 figures, country-wide crime is beginning to fall (Gie 2009). However, rates of crime still differ widely between different locations (Romanovsky and Gie 2006), with the highest figures found in townships. For example, in 2008, for the third consecutive year, Nyanga had the highest murder rate in South Africa (de Vries, Dentlinger, and Sokopo 2008) and together with four other townships, Nyanga accounted for 34% of the reported cases of rape. Additionally, although crime may be decreasing, the fear of crime and concerns over neighbourhood or community safety has grown (Roberts 2008).

4. Interview with the author, 9 July 2008, Etafeni, Nyanga, Cape Town (digital recording in possession of the author).

5. Interviews with the author, 10 November 2009, Etafeni, Nyanga, Cape Town (digital recording in possession of the author).

6. Throughout the project, I regularly asked the participants to respond to a question that had arisen during the day's workshop by writing a few lines in their logbooks. The following day we would usually return to the question and those people who wanted to share their responses would do so, thereby setting the tone for that day's workshop.

7. This statement was clarified to mean ‘more powerful’ both physically and in status because he was her elder.

8. During the follow-up interviews 16 months later, a number of the participants spoke about how the tactics they shared still formed part of the way they lived their lives, thus perhaps for them, these tactics had become strategies. I cannot generalise either way about whether the discussions were a feint or if they developed into strategies. What this example demonstrates, however, is that the participants all respond in different ways to the practice and take different things from the experience, there is no overall, generalisable effect.