I WAS NEVER ALONE is a documentary play script and performance ethnography project that I am developing in collaboration with Joseph Megel (UNC Performance Studies artist-in-residence and director of FREIGHT) and collaborators in Russia. The script focuses on the personal narratives of  seven adults with disabilities living in contemporary Russia, presented in a 90 minute play as a series of monologue-type portraits. The narratives are drawn nearly verbatim from translations of interviews with Russians with a range of disabilities in Russia who have participated in the development of this project since 2012.

Winter 2016 brings two exciting moments in the development of the work. There will be a table reading of the draft script at UCSD as part of the Studio for Ethnographic Design’s new Performance Ethnography Lab series on January 7th. In late January and early February, the play will be workshopped and performed in two public staged readings featuring local actors in the Performance Studies program at UNC-Chapel Hill. The staged readings will take place on Friday, February 5th at 7pm, followed by a talk back session with the audience, and on Saturday, February 6th in the afternoon, followed by a roundtable event featuring local scholars of Russia, disability studies, and performance studies. I will also be talking about the methodology for the project withthe Moral Economies of Medicine working group of the Medical Anthropology Program on Friday February 5th at lunchtime.

See the staged reading details and times on the UNC Department of Communication website.

See the write up in the local news here.