Wellness, Community, and Aging: Refocused and Renewed

Abstract

The Wellness, Community, and Aging (WCA) Focus Group has flourished over the past five years at the Association for Theatre in Higher Education (ATHE). In this article, we recount the history of this focus group, document its transformation, and look to future directions.

Introduction and Brief History

Although it has only existed in its current form for the last five years, the Wellness, Community, and Aging (WCA) Focus Group actually has a long history within ATHE. Originally known as Senior Theatre Research and Performance (STRP), the focus group began in 1973 with the American Theatre Association (ATA) and continued with the creation of ATHE in 1986. Instrumental to the development of STRP was Bonnie L. Vorenberg, an expert in the field of senior theatre who served as president of ArtAge's Senior Theatre Resource Center. Vorenberg was involved with the focus group for two decades, serving alternately as focus group chair and conference planner. According to an early description of the group, STRP was "part of a growing international movement of theatre for, by, and about older adults including grassroots community-based groups," as well as "retirement centers with recreational and therapeutic objectives, non-credit learning in retirement, and college and university-based programs for seniors studying theatre arts and practitioners working with senior theatre." Additionally, the group facilitated "networking and outreach, offering panels on current topics, scholarly research, workshops, and performances by senior theatre groups across the country." STRP conference programming at ATHE largely showcased performances by older adults alongside sessions dedicated to creating theatre with and for seniors.

During the final decade of STRP, the group's membership and proposed offerings declined and eventually plateaued. In response, its members reflected on their shared goals and visions for the group moving forward. Scholars from adjacent fields were both invited and independently drawn to help query, evolve, and rearticulate the mission of the focus group.

STRP Rebrands as WCA

In 2017, Trish Ralph (focus group representative), Ruth Pe Palileo (outgoing conference planner), Barbara Parisi (member-at-large), and Andrew Gaines (incoming conference planner and future focus group representative) took lead as the team revising STRP's mission. Contributing leaders from drama therapy, applied theatre, educational theatre, intergenerational theatre, and community-based theatre encouraged a broader, more impactful transdisciplinary mission that would encompass WCA. They noted that over the past few decades, a wellspring of higher education institutions had developed community partnerships aimed at improving wellbeing and civic engagement within community sites including K-12 schools as well as a range of organizations for adults of all ages (including older adults). Yet, at that time, ATHE did not have a clear home for such scholars and practitioners. The Theatre and Social Change (TASC) Focus Group overlapped to a degree but lacked an explicit focus on health and human development. Whereas TASC emphasized broader social concerns, WCA's interests veered more toward the intersection of theatre and the individual.

The team envisioned a renewed focus group that would network and empower members to research, develop, and interrogate theories, performances, spaces, and practices promoting wellbeing, community engagement, and healthy aging. Another primary aim would be to advocate for the dismantling of ageism, ableism, and stereotypes in the representations of age, health, and wellness on stage and at large in society. WCA would foster the creation of new theatre and performance works related to our renewed mission. Lastly, WCA would seek to advise ATHE on standards for ethics, retention, and tenure and promotion, particularly pertaining to issues of wellness, community, and aging. As discussed later, WCA's CV Clinic and Diversity Statement session are fulfilling this vision.

The team dialogued with STRP membership and other ATHE colleagues about the proposed revision and name change. The positive response and feedback encouraged the team that converting STRP into WCA was filling a gap and meeting a need. Some members also challenged the team to think critically about its reformation. For example, Gwendolyn Alker asked how the convergence of wellness, community, and aging could allow for a broad enough platform for an ATHE focus group, wondering how WCA might broaden its mission to sustain content for future conferences. The team integrated such feedback and brought their proposal to ATHE's Governing Council meeting at the Orlando conference in 2019, where the name change was voted on and approved.

The last five years of growth and revitalization for WCA has thus far affirmed the movement to refocus the group. Moreover, the members responding to WCA's new call for proposals have further helped develop, shape, and refine WCA's mission. Next, we will highlight examples from a trove of presentations sponsored or cosponsored by WCA, drawing on the three related areas of concentration: wellness, community, and aging.

Wellness

WCA members have explored wellness from a wide variety of angles: actor mental health and emotional regulation, faculty self-care, graduate student stress management, toxic rehearsal culture, and the uniquely healing role of theatre and education for individuals, communities, and society at large. One panel showcased the research and practice of using acting students to play standardized patients in medical settings (Lygoumenos et al., 2020). Several sessions have explored the use of drama therapy in higher education and community contexts: Andrew Gaines (2018, 2019, 2020, 2023) has brought drama therapy techniques and perspectives to help members navigate and embrace the thin line between therapy and healing-centered practices. Overall, the focus group embraces and analyzes what James Thompson calls "an aesthetics of care"—a set of values prioritizing equality and "inter-human relations in both the creation and the display of art projects" (44).

The intersection of wellness and theatre took on a whole new meaning with the COVID-19 pandemic. Presenters Barbara Parisi and Alicia Tafoya (2021) unpacked the adaptations of live performance using COVID protocols, while Andrew Waldron and colleagues (2021) explored pedagogical and artistic interventions including explicit and implicit mental health coping mechanisms with young people. Also in 2021, Kelly Bremner and fellow panelists presented on institutional ableism in devised and socially engaged theatre-making during the pandemic.

ATHE's 2023 conference theme, "Building from the Rubble, Centering Care," made the transformation of STRP into WCA seem prescient. With care being central to WCA's mission, we proudly shared our resources, tools, expertise, and creativity toward recognizing, repairing, and recovering from failures of care and remaking ATHE. Since refocusing, WCA is increasingly centering equity, empathy, and historically marginalized voices as we simultaneously elevate belonging, joy, and imagining a better future for our field. In a 2022 interview, Shawn Ginwright, author of The Four Pivots: Reimagining Justice, Reimagining Ourselves, spoke volumes for WCA: "The most radical act of justice we can engage in is care . . . claiming our individual and collective wellbeing." Our call for proposals invited "action-oriented, engaging sessions that advance the dismantling of institutionalized racism, white supremacy, and anti-Blackness." This CFP led to one of our most robust set of offerings, with WCA sponsoring or cosponsoring eleven sessions at the annual conference.

WCA members working within a wide variety of contexts offered innovative modes of practice, dialogues on ethics of wellness and wellbeing, critiques of the relationships between commodified arts, wellness practices, and institutional responsibility, particularly as they related to issues of inequality and inequity across all ages, stages, communities, and abilities. Our presenters addressed the trauma of white supremacy head on. WCA showcased a curation of care-full theatre and education theories and practices within spaces that historically have inhabited and perpetuated oppressive racial structures, laying a path for engaging, inclusive, and restorative relationships.

Community

WCA builds on STRP's original interest in community-based organizations and retirement centers. However, the team expanded community to also encompass higher education institutions, K-12 schools, clinics, prisons, and the full range of aging facilities. Moreover, WCA is now a home for community theatre praxis, which lacked a clear focus group on its own. "Community-Integrated Productions" by Andrew Gaines and colleagues in 2022, cosponsored with the Community College Theatre Alliance, brought together a panel who showcased trends of opening college theatre auditions and production team roles to the public.

WCA has prioritized supporting ATHE members in navigating the difficulties of the academic job market. One popular annual conference session has been the "CV and Cover Letter Clinic," in which individuals at any stage of their careers can receive personalized feedback on their documents. Organized by Conference Planner Erika Hughes in 2021 and 2022, and by Barbara Parisi in 2023, our roster of past mentors has included associate and full professors, department chairs, deans, and provosts. Attendees receive advice from a panel of colleagues who have served on a range of hiring and promotion committees at R1 and R2 institutions, state and private schools, SLACs, and universities outside of the United States.

This past year added a related session, "Diversity Statements and Questions: A Brave Space Long Table Dialogue" organized by Noe Montez and others, where students, faculty, and administrators courageously shared and addressed challenging questions about that essential and sensitive aspect of applying and hiring. One of the key takeaways was how the session was just as much about professional development as it was in service of building community at ATHE. This impact was likely due in part to Lois Weaver's Long Table format, which WCA featured in two of our 2023 sessions.

WCA actively looks to collaborate with other focus groups to create multidisciplinary programming at the annual ATHE conference. In Detroit, WCA jointly co-created a pre-conference session in collaboration with the Theatre and Social Change, Theory and Criticism, and Middle Eastern Theatre Focus Groups. Participants left the Renaissance Center to convene at the local YMCA where local theatre artists and educators facilitated workshops. Sherrine Azab and Jake Hooker, codirectors of A Host of People, led a community-engaged devising workshop. Andrew Morton, the Detroit project manager of TimeSlips Creative Storytelling, showcased the TimeSlips technique. This participatory mode of engagement utilizes visual imagery and open-ended questions, such as "where do you think this is?" or "what do you think is happening here?" to inspire narratives that are collectively developed in the present moment. Similarly, in Austin, WCA and TASC partnered for a wellness-focused version of the TASC standing "Games We Play" session, which was co-facilitated and co-delivered by leadership from both focus groups and featured a particular emphasis on local theatre-makers with a deep connection to the Texan host community (Ellis et al., 2023).

Aging

Removing the word "senior" in STRP was important to the team envisioning the new WCA Focus Group. Firstly, the American Medical Association (AMA) Manual of Style advocates against using it in writing alongside similar othering terms that connote discrimination and negative stereotypes, such as "elderly," "the aged," "old-old," and "young-old." "Older adult" is the preferred term. Readers will find similar guidance in the American Psychological Association style guide. Secondly, by including the word "aging," WCA intended not only to signal a continued dedication to older adults but also to welcome the fullest range of intersection of theatre and education with human development, from cradle to grave. WCA resonates with educational philosopher Gabriel Moran, who proposed that the act of teaching should include a deeper and wider scope of behaviors that "show someone how to live, including how to die" (222). Similar to community theatre, educational theatre studies was not specifically represented at ATHE in 2017, further contributing to the revised WCA mission.

In a society where by 2030 older adults will account for 21% of the American population (Vespa), the need to examine the relationship among theatre, aging, and older adults is more pertinent than ever. This population poignantly includes fellow theatre educators, scholars, and practitioners. " The Rest I Make Up: Documenting the Legacy of Maria Irene Fornes" was a collaboratively presented roundtable by Latinx, Indigenous, and the Americas (LIA) and STRP Focus Groups (Alker et al., 2019). Another powerful roundtable was "Honoring the Legacies of Older Performers: An Interdisciplinary, Inter-generational Discussion" (Jeffri et al., 2019).

WCA sessions have explored themes of ageism, shame, and memory. This work has been located in a variety of settings within leading theatre companies in both the US and the UK, as well as skilled nursing facilities, day centers, and "senior centers"—a term that remains widely used but increasingly debated and challenged. Georgia Bowers (2021, 2022, 2023) presented how regular engagement with theatre activities can challenge ageism and negotiate ageist-induced shame by stimulating resilience through what she has coined "pro-aging praxis." Christine Dunford (2021) reflected on her work with the Memory Ensemble and considered how improvisational techniques can build bridges into agency, connection, adaptation, and resilience in the present moment.

Additionally, WCA Focus Groups have also investigated the value of intergenerational practices, theatre as a mode of care, and the relationship between live performance and the dismantling of ageist stereotypes. Jonah Greene (2023) shared an analysis of Witness Theater and how it preserves traumatic memory with older adults who were witnesses to the Holocaust. As another transdisciplinary example, Greene looked at the intersection of community-focused theatre-making, intergenerational bonding, and witnessing in a post-witness era.

Future Directions

WCA champions empathy, respect, active listening, self-care, self-reflection, curiosity, and inquiry. Together with our members-at-large, the current WCA leadership (Georgia Bowers, focus group representative; Erika Hughes, conference planner; Andy Waldron, secretary; Ural Grant, graduate student representative) approaches the management of the focus group collectively and nonhierarchically and is eager to hear from new members who would like to be involved in future focus group work. We endeavor to continue considering the ways in which theatre practices engender wellness and community, the relationship between creativity and aging, theatre as a means of challenging age-based prejudices, and how theatre brings people together in a neoliberal society that champions independence over interdependence. In this vein, we seek to strengthen our links with fellow focus groups by hosting a mixture of cosponsored panels, pre-conference activities, and conference-based social opportunities that actively seek to connect with the wider ATHE community. As we look toward the future, we intend to continue the growth of our membership and foster a community that champions the significance of wellness, community, and aging in relation to theatre practices.

Moving forward, WCA encourages colleagues to offer a range of traditional research, practice research, and workshop sessions, as well as experiment with nontraditional formats including the Long Table, PechaKucha, and other novel forms that invite participant engagement. At the 2024 conference, we hope to continue the conversations about how the very format of the ATHE conference can best serve our learning community and membership. In the long term, we hope to host events or activities during the academic year and potentially expand our CV clinic to include other clinical sessions on, for example, publishing and grant writing.

Conclusion

As a focus group that is simultaneously one of the oldest and newest in ATHE, WCA owes a great debt to the original leadership and members of STRP who devoted nearly a half-century of investigation into the intersection of aging and theatre. The successful revisioning of the focus group in 2019, which merged multiple areas of related interest, is a testament to its value for ATHE. The authors are grateful for the support of the ATHE Governing Council, who supported the focus group's new name and mission, and the ATHE membership, for deeply engaging in recent sessions sponsored and organized by WCA. As ATHE continues to reconsider, reshape, and reform its very structural underpinnings in the service of creating a more socially just and equitable future, the WCA is thankful for the opportunity to have radically rewritten and refocused in order to better serve our learning communities.