Research Statement

Overview
My scholarship exists at the intersection of performance, pedagogy, and cross-field collaboration — a place where storytelling becomes a form of embodied knowledge and sparks change. My work explores how theatre can amplify marginalized voices and foster dialogue and resilience.

Background
For nearly a decade, I performed a one-woman traveling show titled Mzungu Memoirs, based on four months I spent living in Uganda and volunteering in one of the many internally displaced persons camps for people uprooted by the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) conflict. Working with a nonprofit organization, I conducted field surveys to track economic shifts and other indicators of well-being for some of the 1.8 million people living in the camps. It was a deeply personal, transformative experience that I attempted to communicate through theatre.

Mzungu Memoirs evolved into a traveling production. Along with serving public audiences in the greater Boston area, I performed regularly in educational settings such as Gordon College, where my show became a formal part of the reentry program for students who had studied abroad. The conversations that emerged from Mzungu Memoirs inspired a qualitative study on college student reentry experiences. The coded data of that study informed the design of a reentry curriculum rooted in Theatre of the Oppressed methodologies, also implemented at Gordon.

My research in Uganda informed my artistry. Then, the resulting show created a new avenue for collecting research. As I watched that cycle unfold, it planted the seed for my ongoing inquiry into performance-as-research. What if the work of creating theatre and the experience of engaging with performance both provide vital insight into establishing communities that are more connected and resilient? How can I harness my own experience of theatre as a transformative tool into data-driven research?

Current Projects
Most recently, my MFA thesis investigated how applied theatre can explore the influence of Judeo-Christian theology on female embodiment. Grounded in a literature review spanning theology, embodiment philosophy, feminism, gender theory, and applied theatre practice, I devised a performance with eight female college students. The resulting piece, This Is My Body, performed a seven-show run that challenged the students, the students’ family and friends, and the college itself to question the way our culture raises young women. And as with Mzungu Memoirs, the show created new opportunities for reflection and scholarship.

I presented about the findings and challenges of the project at the American Alliance for Theatre & Education’s “Amplify and Ignite” Symposium in Boston. My article, “Re-memberment” which explores the integration of puppetry in This Is My Body, will be published in a forthcoming edition of Puppetry Journal.

Future Work
A long-term goal is to replicate the This Is My Body devising process with more groups of college-aged women across diverse contexts. My hope is that a compilation of these performances into a full-length work can voice the composite experience of contemporary American women today.

While no audience data was collected during This Is My Body performances to date, future iterations could include surveys and interviews with audience members to bring their experiences into discussion with the performers. A pastor in attendance at one performance suggested that This Is My Body should be performed for groups of clergy. Another audience member said they found the stories to be universal, beyond religious affiliation. These reactions made me want to bring the audience into the conversation.

I have also begun collecting follow-up data about the long-term implications of the devising process. A month after the closing performance, 75% of cast and crew members reported that the show positively influenced their relationship with their body. Will that number change when considered six months or two years post-show? Did this work generate a long-lasting, positive impact? If so, was it because of the way it was devised, the exercises and games we engaged in, the unique cohort, or other factors yet to be identified?

On a related note, I am now adapting my 30,000-word MFA thesis, “This Is My Body: Ensemble-Devised Theatre as a Catalyst for Liberating Female Embodiment in Faith Communities,” into shorter journal articles for submission to publications. I am committed to deepening the integration of performance, research, and community engagement.

I seek to contribute work that not only advances academic conversations but also resonates beyond the academy, inspiring connection and courageous dialogue in an increasingly fragmented world. Whether collaborating with students, faculty across disciplines, or local audiences, I view devised theatre as a research methodology that invites us to process complex experiences. In this way, creative inquiry becomes a means of resilience and transformation.

“…the time is always right to consider how culture frames and enables inhumanity, how it creates and destroys identities, and how it can share in love’s triumph over suffering.”

ERIK EHN