“If it is performative, it has to work within the parameters
of its artistic discipline. It has to work as music, as a play,
and as research."
(Photo L-R: Kelley Jo Burke and Scott Thompson)
Cutting-edge, arts-based research explores experience
of autism through a play with music
Cutting-edge, arts-based research explores the
trauma and transformation of being a parent of a
child with autism through a play with music.
As a seasoned researcher and prolific
author, Dr. Scott Thompson, a full
professor in the Faculty of Education
at the University of Regina, throughout
his career, has been involved in a
broad range of research into inclusive
education, including SSHRC-funded
research projects and a pan-Canadian
disability policy study.
However, Thompson had reached
a stage in his career where he was
looking for new research avenues and
methodologies to explore inclusive
education. After a conversation about
arts-based educational research
(ABER) with colleague Dr. Valerie
Triggs, an assistant professor in arts
education, Thompson says, “I began
reading in this area and...It was
surprising to me that there was this
whole other way of doing research. I
had known of music therapy; I had
known of the relationship between
music education and math, and taking
bits of music and making it a therapy,
but...this [ABER] is a whole different
way of constructing research.”
On the side, under the name Scott
Anthony Andrews, Thompson has
been developing his love of music
through singing and song writing,
and he is about to release his third
CD, I Don’t do Lazy Like That. Other
artists have told Scott Anthony that his
songs have a musical/theatrical bent.
However, Thompson points out, there
is a huge difference between people
saying this and actually writing music
for a play.
When Thompson saw the award-
winning playwright Kelley Jo Burke
perform, Ducks on the Moon, a one-
woman performative memoir based
on her traumatic and transformative
experience as a parent of a child
with autism, he recognized a way
to bring his academic interests and
his song-writing abilities together:
He was inspired to write a musical
reproduction of Burke’s play.
"Kelley Jo is a powerhouse [and] I
knew there was power in the story,”
says Thompson. So, he contacted
Burke.
Alumna Kelley Jo Burke (BEAD,
1990), after many years as a host and
producer of CBC Saskatchewan’s radio
arts performance hour, SoundXchange,
had moved on to complete a Master’s
of Fine Arts in playwrighting and
dramaturgy (MFA, 2013), and,
using her educational background,
had developed and argument for
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