As part of the CareLab course at The New School this past fall, artist and participatory theater pioneer Jon Adam Ross led students in an illuminating discussion on the role theater arts can play in tackling complex community issues. Jon currently serves as the Director of Artistic Programs with his organization Acting for Others.

The session began with an introductory exercise where attendees shared a word or phrase to describe their experience at the New School. Right away this demonstrated what Jon calls the "Chamber of Commerce round"—focusing on the positive while leaving out the full, messy truth of community life. Participatory theater provides a framework to move past initial pleasantries into deeper dialogue and reckoning between a community's multifaceted elements.

Throughout the seminar, Jon reflected on his organization's philosophy of using theater as a way to build trust, spur hard conversations, and transform relationships within troubled communities. Acting for Others employs local teaching artists to lead community workshops and co-create participatory plays drawing from residents' lived experiences. This ground-up creative process gives space for voices often silenced or marginalized when addressing contentious civic issues.

As an example, Jon described a project his group facilitated between police officers and racial justice advocates in Virginia Beach, following the area's history of discrimination in its founding charter. Through theater-building workshops, these groups came together to author a play capturing each of their distinct stories and grievances around regional tensions. Participants later described feeling truly heard by the "other side" often villainized in these conversations.

While upfront about the challenges of balancing myriad perspectives, Jon believes participatory theater succeeds most when it focuses first on nurturing understanding between people rather than mounting advocacy campaigns. Within the alchemy of artmaking and storysharing, new relationships gradually dissolve lingering divisions. Participatory theater demonstrates that when communities listen deeply to each other’s truths, cooperative healing can organically begin.

The seminar emphasized how theater arts provide unique means for communities to collectively process trauma, bridge divides, and strengthen the fabric of civil society. By venturing courageously into participatory art spaces, we have so much to gain from truly seeing, hearing from, and creating alongside those we differ with.