Customer Reviews

The Dramatic Arts and Cultural Studies: Educating against the Grain (Critical Education Practice)

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I can't help wonder whether my difficulty with this book lies in my familiarity with the material or whether it is simply tedious. If you have not had any (and I think I do mean any) experience with Cultural Studies, then this book might raise your awareness of the degree to which all notions of authority are being questioned and probed for the ways they might implicate power (more specifically, power imbalances). I was attracted to this text because of my interest in Process Drama (a more recent formulation of Dorothy Heathcote's Mantle of the Expert) and drawn by Heathcote's introduction. Regrettably, I did not read the introduction online, because it offers praise, however graciously and generously, that indicates Heathcote's lack of deep sympathy with the text. Understandably. Berry's opening chapter is comprised of paragraph upon paragraph of lists - I can't bring myself to reproduce them - of things in crisis. And then there are small sections of things in crisis. And at the end of the book questions to ask to have learners reflect on these things in crisis.

All of this reflection is good, but the questions, while comprehensive in many regards, lack subtlety. In addition, they are unmoored from any context. I will present one here:
33 (out of 116). Is a text a look at power? Exclusions? Values? Representations? Values (yes, twice)? Who controls? Gender/class/age constructions?

An OK series of questions to ask of a text - but basic and bland for my tastes, especially outside of a given text.
Perhaps I am taking for granted the degree to which we need to be ever-aware of these issues. As is, I do not find this text approachable for someone new to the field of Cultural Studies (too labored) nor sufficiently provocative for someone who has mapped out the big questions.
Disappointing.