Drama Research
Image
Storytelling through theatre is a powerful way to reach others.
Led by Dr. Kathleen Gallagher, we are an ensemble of University of Toronto post-doctoral and graduate students, local and international artists, drama teachers, youth social service workers and young people who collaborate to explore the role and uses of drama in the lives of urban youth around the world.
Latest News
On February 24, 2025, the Toronto team hosted a local book launch. Enjoy some of the author talks and pictures from the day!
Image
Based on a six-year ethnographic research study taking place with teachers, artists, community leaders, and young people globally, and taking its lead from the following provocation —can performance become a site for new imaginaries for socio-ecological justice? —this book examines how artful engagement through drama pedagogies can open up more collective, critical, and hopeful forms of thinking and being.
Image
In this article, Dr. Kathleen Gallagher, Ashleigh Allen, and Dr. Christine Balt examine how a virtual, speculative fiction writing and performance workshop nurtured a deeply situated yet expansive aesthetics in which youth can imagine more hopeful futures in their worlds.
Image
Research and Team
Image
Our Research
We are learning that hope might be a political alternative, that activating hope may be a form of audacious citizenship.
Meet Us
We are a research ensemble of diverse collaborators committed to exploring the power of drama to create social change.
In Conversation With
Andrew Kushnir's new article is an invitation to consider the near-absence of Ukrainian stories on Canadian stages in the year since Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine began.
Image
Moving the Centre explores the work of two theatre-makers who simultaneously dare, fumble, and persist in bringing audiences into a space where complicity, authority, and authentic listening are met anew.
Image
What does it mean to be democratic? What’s the difference between being a citizen in a democracy and a subject in an empire? Dr. Urvashi Sahni answered these pressing questions and more in her inspiring and truly engaging TEDtalk.
Image
See here the launch of CODE Conversations with Matthew Sheahan, secondary teacher from Hastings and Prince Edward District School Board and President of the Council of Ontario Dance and Drama Educators interviewing Andrew Kushnir and Zorana Sadiq on their experiences with the Radical Hope research, the Towards Youth production, and their poignant thoughts on why Verbatim theatre is an especially important aesthetic with young people in these times.
Image
Artists for Real Climate Action is a non-partisan, ever-growing collection of actors, filmmakers, writers, musicians, playwrights, graphic designers, directors, and digital marketing folks all sounding the alarm over our climate crisis.
Image
