Start listening at 07.17 to hear a bot more about what one of the organisations I work for does in schools, including a little bit from Andrew Cobson, chief exec of the British Humanist Association, who reinforces how important it is to be fully inclusive of people with non-religious beliefs in interfaith dialogue (and how well 3FF does this).
Enjoy!
Oh, and here's me on the day, with the BEST class I think I've ever taught for the 3FF - they were so good! And one boy (HILARIOUS) was obviously secretly trying to out-do another boy in the class by using long words and echoing some of my speech patterns, to try and look clever, and he said: 'I find her talk very voluptuous'. I have no idea what he was trying to say, but it was TOO FUNNY. 'Gifted and talented' and precocious, apparently... Voluptuous. He wasn't even trying to be sexually intimidating (which I did experience in a different boys Catholic school). The teacher and I had a private giggle at the end of the class. Mrs Malaprop o'clock.
It feels like a long time since my November post where I quietly lamented the end of my full-time education. Well, I suppose it actually feels like about seven months. Approximately. Despite June currently disguising itself as March.
Paulo Friere - Brazilian educator and theorist
I can, however, sleep a little easy in the knowledge (knowledge, yay KNOWLEDGE!) that I have done some educationing; for work I've obviously done some educating - when I have been the educator - but I have also been the educatee, engaging in learning of my own. Now, I'm with Paulo Friere on not being a passive vessel and all that (which makes a link to his wikipedia page have a beautiful sort of irony, dontcha think?), but sometimes passive is about all I can muster. Particularly after a hard day of throwing juggling balls at drug addicts. So, please forgive me if I admit I've been doing some knowledge-receiving on my back. No, that is not any form of sexual allusion. The beast with two backs can stay well out of it. No, no, no.
F.M. Alexander
Basically, I have been learning the Alexander Technique a bit recently, and have thus been doing some lying down homework, where I let my spine chillax. Anyway, apparently the spine takes 17 minutes to properly elongate and spread out and stuff (you can tell I'm quite the scientist, can't you?), SO I've seen this as a splendid opportunity to use the time to expand my spine AND my horizons. I have thus been trying to listen to one TED talk a day, during this time. Now, if you're not familiar with the fucking brilliance that are TED talks, TED (technology, entertainment, design) is a nonprofit devoted to 'Ideas Worth Spreading', and basically consists of all manner of people giving short lectures on all manner of things (a bit like the School of Life, who do wicked sermons - and which is also brilliant and should be checked out if your world has not yet been improved by it). TED do two conferences a year, which are uber expensive to attend; however the best of the lectures are then broadcast online for the world to see. They describe themselves thus:
TED is best thought of as a global community. It's a community welcoming people from every discipline and culture who seek a deeper understanding of the world.
Yesterday, whilst I was doing the washing up (a ridiculous task in itself, as our kitchen sink has been broken for about two months - but you don't want to hear all about that; you are best kept out of my silent, inexorable rage against our landlady), I listened to Julian Baggini: Is there a real you?It's not my favourite TED talk so far, but it does fit in very, very nicely with the theme of the article I recently wrote on story and well-being/identity (see 'Once upon a Friday'). So here's a bit of Baggini for you. And I urge you to check out some more of the TED talks. You'll well impress people at dinner parties....
How better to celebrate the sixty joyous years of Elizabeth II's reign (I really want someone to work out how many days in that time it has actually rained - HOMOPHONE-BASED PUN!), than to reflect on the theatrical goings-on going on with certain gentlemen detained at the pleasure, or otherwise, of her maj? Actually, bearing in mind that to hold one prisoner for a year, it costs around £41,000, and the cost of each new prison place is £170,000 to build and maintain (apologies for 2010 statistics - lazy googling - please leave more update ones in the comment box if you have them to hand), I'd imagine it's not really at the pleasure of anyone. I mean, the only people who might be pleased about the number locked up (Hello, Mr Daily Mail bigot, sorry, I mean reader - OK, my political leanings and tabloid feelings aren't all that subtle) are the ones who think that the cost could be halved if we only could give them bread and water, cut the testicles off the paedophiles and have jolly well done with it. And god forbid we do DRAMA with them. Rehabilitation [scoff]? The only thing it might do is turn them into homosexuals, and then we really WILL need to rehabilitate them. OK, I'm sorry for the slight deviation (I'd never survive on 'Just a Minute'. And, yes, I am 24. And, yes, I am cool.), but I must just quickly further digress and point anyone who's never come across it in the direction of the Daily Mail-o-matic, a gorgeous little website which generates Daily Mail headlines, based on the most frequent words used, e.g.
HAVE LESBIANS MOLESTED BRITAIN'S SWANS?
or
ARE IMMIGRANTS GIVING COMMON SENSE AND DIGNITY CANCER?
Oh, and if you haven't seen it, you also HAVE to watch The Daily Mail Song, by DAN & DAN:
Wow, I'm really heading off topic. Sorry. It's just I saw first-hand the impact of Jack Straw's dickish Prison Service Instruction in 2009, which stated that 'activities for prisoners' must be 'appropriate, purposeful and meet the public acceptability test', and we knew at the time what that meant, and who that public was. So shitting on the Daily Mail is actually less off topic than might be first conceived. I could totally argue my point to Nicholas Parsons....
ANYWAY, to try and back-track my way into a finished paragraph: I thought I would celebrate the Jubilee by waxing jubilant about some prison theatre I've been to in recent weeks. Most recently, on Wednesday night, just a couple of days ago, I saw an AMAZING performance of Mamet's Glengarry Glen Ross; a play I had, to my shame, seen neither on stage or screen before this week. The production was put together by Synergy Theatre Project, a company I have much admiration for in their work to rehabilitate through the transformative power of theatre.
I have now seen a number of productions in various prisons across the country, and each one has its own cause for celebration, reflection and admiration. What struck me most about Synergy's production this week, however, was the enormous talent of the men performing. I know from first-hand experience that the standard of the performances in prisons and the talent amongst the cast is not to be under-estimated, or dealt with patronisingly, however the cast of Glengarry this week were probably the most talented I've so far seen behind locked doors. Not out of place in one of our top national theatres.
The other prison excursion I haven't quite got round to writing about on here yet is The Accidental Imposter in HMP Winchester, by Playing for Time Theatre Company, which I saw a few weeks ago. Also a fantastic production, it was very reminiscent for me of The Government Inspector (which I co-directed there in 2010), no doubt due to the overt themes of deception, crime and punishment, and corruption at its heart. With fantastically original use of multi-media throughout the production, by the talented LaunchPad Productions, it was great to see such innovative use of film employed throughout. Despite this, I personally hope next year the company think about returning to their more traditional theatrical roots, with a play set in a very different historical moment, like they did with Oh What a Lovely War!and The Convict's Opera. Just personal preference.
