{"id":24155,"date":"2015-05-04T14:42:01","date_gmt":"2015-05-04T18:42:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/news\/?p=24155"},"modified":"2015-05-11T15:20:27","modified_gmt":"2015-05-11T19:20:27","slug":"emu-stage-adaptation-of-andy-carvins-distant-witness-immerses-audience-in-tech-driven-revolution-of-arab-spring","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/news\/2015\/emu-stage-adaptation-of-andy-carvins-distant-witness-immerses-audience-in-tech-driven-revolution-of-arab-spring\/","title":{"rendered":"EMU stage adaptation of Andy Carvin’s ‘Distant Witness’ immerses audience in tech-driven revolution of Arab Spring"},"content":{"rendered":"

The story of a man with 107,000 Twitter followers \u2013 famous for publicizing the \u201cArab Spring\u201d via social media \u2013 has been dramatized by Eastern Mennonite University faculty and students.<\/p>\n

Andy Carvin, then working at NPR in Washington, DC. played \u201cdistant witness\u201d to events documented via Tweets by \u201ccitizen journalists\u201d in Tunisia, Syria, Egypt, Libya and other Middle Eastern countries from December 2010 into 2012. In 2013, Carvin published a book by the same name. EMU theater<\/a> and social media classes, led by professors Justin Poole<\/a> and Paulette Moore<\/a>, initially adapted the book for the stage in the fall of 2014.<\/p>\n

Workshop performances on Friday, May 8, and Saturday, May 9, represent a more formalized scripting. Both events, which are free and open to the public, begin at 7:30 p.m. in the Studio Theater on campus and will be followed by a talkback with Carvin and the play\u2019s creators.<\/p>\n

The event is co-sponsored by EMU’s Center for Justice and Peacebuilding<\/a> and the Valley Arts Council<\/a>. The latter has granted funds through the Advancing the Arts Grant Award<\/a> to develop a full-fledged play that will debut in the spring of 2016.<\/p>\n

An ensemble production<\/h3>\n

The creation of the \u201cDistant Witness\u201d play has merged multiple interests and specialties of its co-creators. Poole, who developed most of the current adaptation, had previously worked in cross-cultural theater and specifically with Arab culture organizations.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019d been wanting to do a project on the Arab Spring for some time,\u201d Poole says, adding that he visited Egypt mere months before the uprisings began. \u201cI witnessed a lot of class tensions. This prompted my interest in what those tensions might mean.\u201d<\/p>\n

Poole became involved in the fall of 2014, when professor Paulette Moore, on behalf of students in her \u201cSocial Media\u201d class, invited the campus community to a Skype interview with Carvin. (Moore had met Carvin at a Washington, DC. conference and had been using his book in her courses as required reading.)<\/p>\n

Poole and Moore decided to integrate the social media class with Poole\u2019s \u201cDevised Theater\u201d class, in which students are taught the principles of ensemble play development. Eventually, the two professors pitched the idea of adapting the book for the stage to Carvin.<\/p>\n

\"Arab<\/a>
Carvin, flanked by professors Paulette Moore and Justin Poole, meets with students from the combined social media and devised theater class.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cHe was very receptive [to the idea] and gave us some feedback on how to frame it immediately,\u201d Moore said.<\/p>\n

Groups of students in the combined class were asked to explore specific sections of the book through various improvisational exercises,\u00a0 research and discussions \u2013 the results of which helped Poole write the play later. Throughout the process, students shared their experiences through live Tweets. Carvin followed the students\u2019 progress via the social network<\/a> and responded to their questions.<\/p>\n

\u201cAndy \u2018dropped in\u2019 virtually to one of the early classes unexpectedly and then showed up regularly thereafter,\u201d said Moore. \u201cIt was pretty thrilling for the students.\u201d<\/p>\n

In an interview with EMU news, Carvin applauded this cross-disciplinary creativity. The play \u201cdoes justice to the Tweets that were written in real time,” he said. “It shows the authors were actual people calling for the world to bear witness to their reality.”<\/p>\n

Each week, Carvin saw the students beginning to gain a better understanding of \u201cthe circumstances in which the revolutions were happening in the Arab world.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tweeting is also a good way to illustrate how journalism is changing, he said, adding that 140-character Tweets may have as much impact on the world community as traditional journalism.<\/p>\n

Audience immersed in media-rich environment<\/h3>\n

Both the production in the fall, which occurred during Poole\u2019s class final, and the spring workshop are what Poole calls \u201chybrid\u201d productions. \u201cIt is designed to be a totally immersed experience for actors and audience,\u201d he said, in words that evoke a living IMAX production.<\/p>\n

The performance is in the round and will combine videography, streamed YouTube videos (taken from actual footage by citizen journalists in the Middle East), dialogue adapted from the book, Tweets from people during the Arab Spring, and live streaming of both audience and actors.<\/p>\n

The actors are students from both Moore and Poole\u2019s classes who are staying on campus for two weeks after the semester ends to participate in the production. Moore said he hopes a few volunteer actors from the Summer Peacebuilding Institute<\/a>, which includes approximately 50 peacebuilders from 20 countries, will join the production.<\/p>\n

As for the audience experience: \u201cI hope that the viewers come away from the experience of watching this piece with a better understanding of the Arab Spring,\u201d Poole said. \u201cI want to humanize these stories. I want to bring these stories close to home. I think plays are a really great way for people to learn how to be empathetic with people from other cultures and to break down cultural boundaries.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The story of a man with 107,000 Twitter followers \u2013 famous for publicizing the \u201cArab Spring\u201d via social media \u2013 has been dramatized by Eastern Mennonite University faculty and students. ... read more about EMU stage adaptation of Andy Carvin’s ‘Distant Witness’ immerses audience in tech-driven revolution of Arab Spring<\/span><\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":24165,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4515,7931,5583,14184,14715,12503,264,12499,5147,5730,12507],"tags":[17236,16697,15040,5688,13890],"feature":[],"class_list":["post-24155","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-academics","category-arts","category-campus-community","category-campus-guests","category-campus-life","category-cjp","category-graduate-programs","category-spi","category-theater","category-undergraduate-programs","category-vaca","tag-cjp","tag-distant-witness","tag-justin-poole","tag-npr","tag-paulette-moore"],"yoast_head":"\nEMU stage adaptation of Andy Carvin's 'Distant Witness' immerses audience in tech-driven revolution of Arab Spring - 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