Multilingual Theatre Voice Training in South Africa: Our Translingual Attempt Employing Lessac Kinesensics

ABSTRACT

Teaching theatre voice in a multilingual paradigm (as present in South African education) is complex as it engages with various identities simultaneously. It is taken as given that people navigate their worlds through the use of language, where the language is contextual, meaning driven, identity forming, and affirming. Furthermore, such navigation differs from language to language, resulting in the potential for conflicting and conflictual navigations, power dynamics, conceptual differences, and other complexities. This is compounded when the language of learning differs from many of the first languages present in the classroom. This article presents the authors’ attempts within the South African higher education environment to create a translingual learning space where inclusivity and diversity are acknowledged, affirmed, and actively utilized. The authors use a participatory action research project in which they draw on principles from Lessac Kinesensics to create and invite translingual explorations and learning opportunities. They specifically report on the construction and use of a Setswana workbook as a first formal step toward affirming translingual learning space, committing to and embracing transformation.

KEYWORDS:

• Lessac Kinesensics
• translingual
• multilingual
• voice training
• identity
• Setswana
• South Africa

Acknowledgments

We gratefully acknowledge the guidance of the Voice and Speech Review’s editorial team in the structuring of the academic argument, as well as the advice of Allan Munro, PhD. Additionally, Dr. Lemmer’s contribution in this article falls under the auspices of the University of Pretoria, as it formed part of her doctoral studies which she completed in 2018.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. The currency is South African Rand.

2. The contributions of the various South African and international team members, particularly Morné Steyn (University of Pretoria) and Deb Kinghorn (in her role as Lessac Kinesensics Master Teacher), who are committed to this approach, are acknowledged.

3. This is reflected in the 2017 profile of first years at TUT Drama Department.

4. Blakeslee and Blakeslee (2007) define interoception as processing “sensations arising from the viscera and internal tissues of the body (213); exterioception as the “ability to perceive the world outside the self” (212) through the various senses; and proprioception the “internal sense of where … body parts as located in space and how they are moving” (214).

5. “[Ae]sthetic actions which are instinctively and organically ‘known’ to the human body on both body-as-object and body-as-subject levels” (Munro 2017, 16).

6. Lessac and Kinghorn (2014) describe organic instruction as “the body teaching you instead of you attempting to exert control over your body” (13).

7. Lifter, Foster-Sanda, Arzamarski, Briesch and McClure (2011) indicate how important play is in learning.

8. The creation of a safe space speaks firstly to the expectations of the triune brain (see Hart 2018) for physical safety, followed by emotional safety. To provide a space where the students are physically safe is relatively easy and can generally be guaranteed. This is the case in most universities unless there are strikes or protests, during which time such classes should not be taking place. Emotional safety is much more complex and speaks to the need of all humans to be “accepted, approved and appreciated” (concepts first posited by Giblin 1956). Within the context of LK, the creation of an emotionally safe space starts with respectfully engaging with students, focussing on human congruencies while acknowledging their personal “uniquenesses” and lived experiences. Explorations are engaged with in a playful manner, drawing on Lessac’s “child-like curiosity” (Munro et al. 2017), with the facilitator constantly circumventing potential triggers of anger and fear, with the purpose of facilitating effective and efficient use of bodyvoice as aligned with the sense of self.

9. A transmissional mode of teaching treats the students as objects, and makes use of monological instructions.

10. Please see Munro et al. (2017) for a discussion on the Vocal NRGs.

11. Lessac Kinesensics uses the progression of “tasting, music-making and communicating” when exploring Consonant NRGs.

12. Setswana Linguist Bodibadi Makgoko and Lessac Kinesensics practitioner Khensani Maluleka.

13. During their undergraduate training, L1 was often used as application text, but not as core explorations, as all the primary voice systems applied in actor training are written in English.

14. Dr. Refilwe Ramagoshi.

15. The reader, familiar with Lessac Kinesensic’s tonosensory scoring, may note that in these examples there are not playable consonant opportunities. As noted, the language is pitch-based and as such, generally the speaker will use Tonal and Structural opportunities to express intent. A limited amount of consonant markings are applicable. This demonstrates the use of LK principles while celebrating the character of the language.

Additional information

Funding

This article is partially based on research supported by the National Research Foundation (NRF) of South Africa: N00421 (UID) 85837. The grant holder, Prof. M. Munro, acknowledges that the opinions, findings and conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this article are her own, and that the NRF accepts no liability whatsoever in this regard.

Notes on contributors

Marth Munro

Marth Munro, PhD, specializes in bodymind and voice in behavior and performance. She is a Lessac Master Teacher®. She was one of the editors of Play with Purpose: Lessac Kinesensics in Action (2017) and of the Lessac Festschrift (2009). She was associate editor of several Voice and Speech Reviews (1999–2006). She has taught in South Africa, the United States of America, and Croatia. She is a certified Laban/Bartenieff Movement Analyst™, certified NLP Life, Business and Executive coach, qualified sound therapist, qualified Hatha Yoga teacher, and a Bio-, Neurofeedback practitioner. She is Professor Extraordinaire at the Drama Department, University of Pretoria and a rated researcher (National Research Foundation, South Africa).

Karina Lemmer

Karina Lemmer, PhD, recently received her doctorate (University of Pretoria), in which she examined multilingual embodied acting in the South African context, in for examination. She is a Lessac practitioner and a lecturer at the TUT Department of Drama and Film where she specializes in voice and acting. She has adapted and directed several productions and has also created original multilingual South African theatre within the academic context and for platforms such as the National Arts Festival and other festivals. She has presented at National and International Conferences and conducted facilitation and voice coaching, broadly in South Africa, Botswana, and Kenya.