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Theater as a tool for promoting interculturality: An ethnographic study among secondary school students in Otavalo, Ecuador

Abstract:

In recent years, several secondary schools in Ecuador have strived to promote the development of intercultural practices among their students. Nevertheless, very often schools face problems putting these concepts into practice. This paper aims to show that theater and ethnography can be used as a tool to promote interculturality within these spaces. The methodology was a combination of classical ethnography techniques and arts based research. The study was carried out in a high school located in the Otavalo area. The research consisted of two phases. The first phase was an ethnographic analysis of the intercultural dynamics among students. In the second phase a play aimed to promoting intercultural dialogue was developed. The results show that theater can generate both theoretical knowledge about interculturality and spaces for intercultural practices.