The main focus of the Fifth International Drama in Education Research Institute will be:

RETURNING THE GAZE, RECLAIMING THE VOICE:
Post Colonialism and its implications for Drama and Education

The purpose of this Fifth International Institute will be above all to make connections. It seeks to examine ways in which Drama, in an educational context, can forge links between issues of colonialism, imperialism and Third World nationalism on the one hand, and of race, ethnicity and multiculturalism on the other.

It will, hopefully, assist in making even a small contribution to the promotion of a global shift away from the type of Eurocentric thinking which has traditionally been at the core of identity production, in which Drama in Education often holds a key position, and towards a Polycentric multiculturalism which is both reciprocal and dialogical.

This type of multiculturalism decolonizes representation, not only in terms of cultural artifacts - literary canons, museum exhibits, performance art Ð but also in terms of power relations between communities. For the researcher, it establishes connections between the usually compartmentalized fields of media studies, literary theory, reflexive and experimental ethnography, Third World feminism and postcolonial studies.

It is hoped that IDIERI 5 will provide an opportunity for researchers of varying levels of experience to reflect on ways in which contemporary representation in Drama presents an opportunity to place often ghettoized histories and discourse in productive relation. As Ella Shohat and Robert Stam state in their book Unthinking Eurocentrism
Within an ongoing struggle of hegemony and resistance, each act of cultural interlocution leaves both interlocutors changed.

The Gaze is returned, and the Voice reclaimed.