What is applied theatre and how can people benefit from it? Philadelphia theater professor provides insight

• Aniya Faulcon
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  Aniya Faulcon is The Spark Host/Producer for WITF. She has a passion for shining a light on unique people, experiences, and perspectives within the community.
  
  Previously she worked as the People and Social Trends Reporter/Video Anchor for LancasterOnline | LNPNews. During her time there, she created video packages, provided Facebook Live coverage at community events, and wrote data-driven stories with census data and feature stories on local leaders, non-profit organizations, events, and people with unique talents and experiences within Lancaster County.
  
  Aniya also worked at WMAR ABC 2 News as a Sales Assistant and at the AFRO American Newspapers as an Executive Assistant and Media correspondent. Aniya interned at WEAA Gospel Grace 88.9 and worked at her alma mater’s radio station, WWPJ at Point Park University, where she gained skills and a passion for radio.
  
  Aniya grew up in Baltimore, Maryland and attended the Baltimore School for the arts for high school with a concentration in acting. She continued to hone her skills and passion for storytelling and later graduated from Point Park University in 2018 with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Acting and Broadcast Reporting. Aniya is eager to continue her journey with storytelling in her role with WITF, as she aims to shed a light on real people and real stories within Pennsylvania in a variety of mediums.

 Scott Robbins

On The Spark Tuesday, we sparked conversation about an art form that many may not know about, applied theatre.

Fadi Skeiker, Philadelphia based, Syrian-born theater practitioner and theatre professor at the University of the Arts, has used applied theater, for over a decade to help people across the world, as a tool to address youth, human rights issues, and other issues as it relates to refugees and other marginalized groups.

Skeiker joined us to discuss his story, applied theater and how marginalized communities can benefit from it.

Skeiker said, applied theater is an umbrella term that includes theater, education, drama therapy and community based theater to address social and individual issues without a final performance at the end. In this art form, the applied theater practitioner or a community member identifies an issue and artists lead exercises, dramatize the issue, dialogue about it and improvise scenarios of how they could address the issue.

“Let’s listen to each other, be compassionate to each other and hear each other’s stories,” Skeiker said. “I just want people to be able to share their stories in a way where they know there’s someone listening and hopefully applied theater would be a safe platform for people to listen actively to someone else.”