The result of a unique three-year collaboration between Ugandan playwright, researcher, teacher and folklore exponent, Dr Mercy Mirembe Ntangaare and New Zealand teacher, playwright and researcher, Susan Battye, the e-book provides many contemporary and historical perspectives on Ugandan dance and drama.
Within Africa, Uganda shines like a pearl, being among the first to acknowledge and address the reality of corruption, AIDS and civil war through dance and drama. Two contrasting ethnic dances are fully described and simply demonstrated to students in the e-book through the use of video, text, and photographs. Dance and drama performances, and interviews with key participants, have been transcribed, with relevant video clips and photographs.
Featured items include various forms of Dance and Drama in Uganda like; cultural dances, folksongs, dance drama, political plays, children's theatre, puppetry, acrobatics, community theatre, and Theatre for Development projects involving young women from Iganga's Twogere Girls Club, and Bushenyi Districts' Bweranyangi Girls' Senior Secondary School.
The text of the iconic Ugandan play, The Song of Wankoko by martyred playwright, Byron Kawadwa, as well as excerpts from Dr Mercy Mirembe's Lady Will You Marry Me The Chief of Shumankuzi or The Corrupt Chief and Mary Karooro Okurut's The Curse of the Sacred Cow is included.
Supporting articles by one of the early trainers at Makerere University's Music Dance and Drama Department, Professor Rose Mbowa, Dr Mercy Mirembe Ntangaare, and others provide an insight into the significance of Ugandan theatre in its historical and contemporary post colonial context.
This e-book includes links to key cultural and educational policy documents, as well as institutions such as the National Theatre of Uganda, public universities, professional associations such as the Eastern Africa Theatre Institute (EATI), Dramatool, and Ugandan publishers.
A comprehensive set of activities for use by secondary students accompanies the work. The e-book offers an insight into a society that is a microcosm of an African country in development, courageous and self reflective, honest and forthright in its approach to life. At the centre of this society's growth lies its culture and this unique e-book reflects the Ugandan determination, despite the odds to grow as a nation through the use of dance and drama. See more from Susan Battye The e-book is recommended for use by students and teachers of: Dance, Drama, Music, Social Sciences, Health Sciences, Cultural Studies and Languages in primary, secondary and tertiary institutions.
