African Songlines: Warren Nebe at TEDxWitsUniversity
The speaker argues that healing and progress in South Africa require adopting the principle of *ubuntu*, necessitating a shift from simplistic crisis management to embodied learning systems. This change can be achieved by integrating drama and theatre to help the community grieve, thereby confronting the deep-seated issues of stigma, trauma, and inequality surrounding issues like HIV/AIDS. The process emphasizes community witnessing and ethical practice, exemplified by a playback theatre performance where an audience member was supported after revealing a deeply personal story. ## Speakers & Context - Unnamed drama therapist and educator. - The talk is framed by the speaker's passion for theatre. - The speaker addresses major national crises, including violence (34 people killed the previous week), political infighting, and unresolved health issues like HIV and AIDS. ## Theses & Positions - The fundamental guiding principle for national recovery must be *ubuntu*, defined as "I am who I am because of you." - Progress requires finding ways to *embodiment* this concept within educational systems. - Addressing national trauma requires a shared process of grieving—*"so that we can begin to grieve the grieving that needs to be done in this country so that we can move on."* - Early crisis responses (like those regarding HIV/AIDS) often failed because the messaging was simplistic and focused on fear, exacerbating stigma rather than achieving true change. - True social transformation requires engaging the *intrapersonal* (self) and the *interpersonal* (the "me and you"), fostering a "context of meaning" built through relationships. - The educational model must move beyond singular, siloed knowledge (like private schooling) to one that grounds learning in relationship, community, and shared human experience. ## Concepts & Definitions - **Ubuntu:** The notion that "I am who I am because of you." - **Embodied Ways:** Ways of learning and practicing that are physically and emotionally internalized, not just intellectual. - **Drama for Life:** A program designed to bring students from across Africa to study together, attempting to source an African vision. - **Reflective Practitioner:** An ability to look through someone else's eyes, stand in their shoes, and simultaneously understand one's own position. - **Playback Theatre:** An experimental process where an audience member tells their story, and the actors immediately perform that story back to them in a symbolic process. - **Traumatized Space:** A conceptual environment where people are constantly fixed in reactive positions, preventing forward movement. ## Mechanisms & Processes - **Theatre as a medium:** Used historically in Africa because drama proved to be the most extensively used medium, particularly in rural areas, to convey complex messages. - **Research process:** Involved an appraisal mission across Africa, using surveys to observe how theatre was used to communicate major crises. - **Ethical Intervention:** The drama field has been exploited by donor organizations and governments, dictating messaging (e.g., if money was from the George Bush administration, the message *had* to be about HIV and AIDS). - **The transformation process (Playback):** An audience member tells a story of vulnerability (e.g., a young woman whose mother contracted HIV/AIDS and blamed her), which is then performed back, allowing the community to witness and validate the experience. - **Curricular requirement:** Program classes cannot consist of more than fifty percent South Africans; engaging the rest of the world is necessary for systemic change. ## Timeline & Sequence - **Early HIV/AIDS days:** Government departments and artists used imagery rooted in fear, which did not change behavior but increased stigma. - **Past experience with theatre:** Initial attempts at using theatre about HIV/AIDS failed because they merely repeated old ideas. - **Dream sequence:** A recurring dream experienced just before leaving South Africa, involving Nelson Mandela leading the speaker through a beautiful, sacred, empty rock-stone building. - **Program initiation:** Development of "Drama for Life" to gather students from across Africa to study together. - **Later demonstration:** Working with HIV-positive activists (Lunghi, Lindy) to use photographs and performance to tell stories. ## Named Entities - **Nelson Mandela:** Figure central to the speaker’s recurring dream and inspiration. - **Prince Charles:** Named for bringing attention to the issue of global corporations buying agricultural land in Africa. - **George Bush administration:** Cited as an example of donor funding influencing the mandated message of art/activism. - **UCLA:** Institution associated with Gideon Mendel and David Gear who taught photography to the activists. ## Numbers & Data - **34:** Number of people killed in South Africa last week (at the time of the talk). - **50:** Maximum percentage of South Africans allowed in the drama program classes. - **14:** Age of the young woman in the playback theatre example. ## Examples & Cases - **The historical problem:** Art was often forced to address only "HIV and AIDS" when funded by international donors, neglecting broader social realities. - **The critique of early art:** HIV/AIDS was painted as a "demon in dressed in red," leading to violent responses like stoning in Swaziland. - **Playback Theatre Case:** A 14-year-old girl, whose mother contracted HIV/AIDS, was initially silenced due to cultural and class position, but her story, when witnessed by the group, sparked an "extraordinary transformation" by removing the burden of shame. - **The dream:** A vision of the speaker with Nelson Mandela walking through a beautiful, open African landscape and entering a sacred, light-filled space. - **Final Production:** "Through Positive Eyes," a performance created by the actors, working with HIV-positive activists, using photographs of their lives. ## Tools, Tech & Products - **Theatre/Drama:** The primary methodology and medium used for social commentary and healing. - **Photography:** Used by Gideon Mendel and David Gear to document the lives of HIV activists, informing subsequent performance. ## Counterarguments & Caveats - The initial academic/donor approach to HIV/AIDS messaging was too simplistic and failed to engage the audience emotionally. - The speaker acknowledges that the dramatic process raises complex issues regarding ethics and safety. - The speaker notes that in South Africa, the term "community" is often used dismissively or with "lowest status" implications. ## Methodology - **Applied Drama/Drama Therapy:** The core field of study and intervention. - **Triangulation of Learning:** Incorporating the *intrapersonal*, *interpersonal*, and *community* spheres to create meaning. - **Witnessing:** The act of the community collectively bearing witness to another person's experience (e.g., in playback theatre). - **Ethical Consideration:** Recognition that all work must adhere to fundamental human rights and requires ongoing supervision and support spaces. ## Conclusions & Recommendations - The most critical educational need is to build spaces that allow people to "reimagine who we are" by fostering profound connections rather than superficial individual achievement. - Practitioners must focus on creating "context of meaning" through relationship building. - A call to action to reconnect and understand one another, regardless of background or belief. ## Implications & Consequences - The neglect of systemic issues (poverty, trauma, inequality) means that purely technical or educational fixes will fail; the root must be emotional and relational. - Failure to adopt *ubuntu* leads to cyclical conflict and the inability to grieve the necessary national trauma. ## Verbatim Moments - *"I am who I am because of you."* (Definition of *ubuntu*) - *"The people like Desmond Tutu man paler and paler many others have have proposed to us..."* - *"People have been doing that for years and it hasn't worked nothing's changed."* - *"this extraordinary poverty of ideas an extraordinary poverty of ideas"* - *"the symbolism if there was any revolved around this idea that HIV and AIDS once this demon"* - *"the poverty of imagination of how to even begin to address a problem so great"* - *"the dream... it was easy and it was light and we were talking..."* - *"What kind of education do we need to create in order to address the 21st century here in Africa"* - *"you do not have to carry the shame"* - *"The ability to look through someone's else's eyes and the ability to stand in their shoes and look back at you and know your position"* - *"I'm going to tell your story I'm going to tell all of your story I'm going to get to know everything about you"*