This article draws on a twenty-year relationship of short-term interventions with Dalit communities living in informal settlements, sub-cities and urban villages in Mumbai, that have sought to create public theatre events based on research by and with communities that celebrate, problematise and interrogate sustainable urban living. In looking back over the developments and changes to our working methods in Mumbai, I explore how the projects priorities the roles of the community as both researchers and artists. I consider where a specific applied theatre project, which focuses on site specific storytelling with Dalit communities in Worli Koliwada and Dharavi, functions on a continuum of interactive, participatory, and emancipatory practice, research and performance. Applied Theatre practices should not and cannot remain static, they need to be constantly reformed and as practitioners and researchers we need to constantly re-examine the ways in which we work. This chapter poses two central questions: firstly, can this long-term partnership between practitioners, researchers and artists from the UK and India working with community members genuinely be a space for co-creating knowledge and theatre? And secondly, if so, is this Theatre-based Research or Research Based Theatre? I interrogate Applied Theatre’s potential to create a space of cognitive justice, which must be the next step for applied theatre, along-side its more widely accepted aims of searching for social and spatial justice and which places the community as both artists and researchers. The Dalit social reality is one of oppression, based on three axes: social, economic and gender. The chapter explores how working as co-researchers and the public performance of their stories has been a form of ‘active citizenship’ for these participants and is a key part of their strategy in their demand for policy changes. In looking forward I ask how working in international partnerships with community members can promote cognitive justice and go beyond a merely participatory practice. I consider why it is vital for the field that applied theatre practice includes partners from both the global south and north working together to co-create knowledge, new methods of practice to ensure an applied theatre knowledge democracy. In doing so I will discuss if and how this work might be considered to be Theatre-based Research.

中文翻译：

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应用戏剧：基于研究的戏剧，还是基于戏剧的研究？探索在印度非正式住房区中寻找社会、空间和认知正义的可能性，或榕树的故事

本文借鉴了与生活在孟买非正规住区、次城市和城中村的达利特社区二十年的短期干预关系，这些社区试图在社区研究的基础上创建公共戏剧活动，庆祝、解决问题并质疑可持续的城市生活。在回顾我们在孟买工作方法的发展和变化时，我探讨了这些项目如何优先考虑社区作为研究人员和艺术家的角色。我认为一个特定的应用戏剧项目，重点是与沃利科利瓦达和达拉维的达利特社区进行特定地点的故事讲述，在互动、参与和解放实践、研究和表演的连续体中发挥作用。应用戏剧实践不应也不可能保持静止，它们需要不断改革，作为实践者和研究人员，我们需要不断重新审视我们的工作方式。本章提出了两个核心问题：首先，英国和印度的实践者、研究人员和艺术家与社区成员之间的这种长期伙伴关系能否真正成为共同创造知识和戏剧的空间？其次，如果是的话，这是基于戏剧的研究还是基于研究的戏剧？我质疑应用戏剧创造认知正义空间的潜力，这必定是应用戏剧的下一步，同时其更广泛接受的目标是寻求社会和空间正义，并将社区定位为艺术家和研究人员。达利特人的社会现实是一种压迫，基于三个轴：社会、经济和性别。本章探讨了作为共同研究人员的工作以及他们的故事的公开表演如何成为这些参与者的“积极公民身份”的一种形式，并且是他们要求政策变革的战略的关键部分。展望未来，我问与社区成员建立国际伙伴关系如何能够促进认知正义并超越单纯的参与性实践。我认为，为什么应用戏剧实践领域至关重要，包括来自全球南方和北方的合作伙伴共同创造知识和新的实践方法，以确保应用戏剧知识民主。在此过程中，我将讨论这项工作是否以及如何被视为基于剧场的研究。