ABSTRACT
Recent developments in second generation cognitive science have helped reveal the complex ways that embodied processes construct meaning. While these ideas have been integrated into dramatherapy and embodied trauma theories, the field of performance and trauma still draws heavily on literary trauma theory. This in turn is based on an abreactive model of trauma which relegates meaning-making to the verbal sphere. This chapter addresses this gap, connecting performance and trauma to second generation cognitive science. At this intersection, the chapter interrogates how Lecoq theatre techniques are employed in the author’s directorial practice to create meaning. The inquiry is centred around a cross-community participatory theatre production in Derry, Northern Ireland, created with first responders who worked through the Troubles. The methodology is grounded in Robin Nelson’s Practice as Research in the Arts model, adapted according to Heron and Reason’s extended epistemology. The research demonstrates how the tools of transposition and embodied play can be used to generate new meanings through theatre which responds to trauma. It also shows that theatrical forms which were designed to increase sensorimotor engagement and affective arousal took more time to work with sensitively. The author concludes that more research at this intersection is warranted.
