Refugee Crisis and Care-Giving, Theatre and Mediation: Performing Identity for the Voiceless in a Statelessness

Abstract

Refugee defines vulnerable individuals who have lost the protection of their country of origin and, who cannot or are usually unwilling to return there due to a well-founded fear of persecution. This study considered the problems faced by refugees as man-made. Its focus was to provide an alternative platform other than the traditional mode of care provision that will better mediate refugee crises within and outside asylum communities. To achieve this aim, this researcher examined the cathartic effects of Drama and Theatre on its audience, participants and society at large. Since Drama and Theatre deals with struggles between opposing forces and seeks to provide solutions to them, the study considered the cathartic nature of drama and theatre to posses the capability and capacity to re-orientate, reform, transform and reintegrate refugees within asylum communities. This was possible because, as an experience and with the tools it uses, the theatre was found to connect people as a crowd and hence, creating a bond amongst them. The effect of this is that this bond simultaneously makes such experiencing people have a collective empathy and thus humanizing them. Since drama and theatre have the capacity to mediate in both the internal and external conflicts that confront refugees by helping them develop resilience, hope and reinforce identities, this study recommended the use of drama and theatre approaches as veritable intervention tools and best mediating alternatives to engender a more humanitarian, cohesive and stable society for all.