After a short talk about the importance of considering representation and stereotypes — with examples of the aggressive, violent, murderous, raping American GI and the pedophile Japanese photographer characters coming up from student discussions in the past — I finally had my drama class students start discussing the plot and characters of the plays they’re going to write and perform, and they had a blast.
We had some interesting discussions in the small groups, such as the importance of making character sets who could interact as much as possible — and thereby, have a stake in one anothers’ actions in complex and interactive ways, with the Chinese proverb