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Applied Anthropology meets Applied Improvisation

Author: Brad Fortier

It seems that there are two professional communities who are focused on

organizational, cultural, and policy development that are unaware or uninformed about

one another. Applied Anthropologists have been in the realm of development formally

for over 50 years utilizing ethnographic techniques to learn about peoples’ lives and

communities in order to create and administer reasonable policies for these communities

and organizations. Applied Improvisation, the introduction and use of improvisational

theater techniques and ideas to develop organizations, has been around for over a decade

using theater techniques to elicit and explore peoples’ stories, as well as give them tools

for building sustainable organizations and relationships. Both of these fields share very

similar goals, but they differ in methodologies and slightly in theory. However, these

two fields can come together in helping one another achieve their ends through a

cooperative systemic exploration utilizing each others’ methods and theories. The field

of Applied Anthropology could definitely be bolstered, if not streamlined, by the

incorporation of Applied Improvisation.

Improvised theater shares a common trait with Applied Anthropology, and that is

the element of having to prove itself as a viable form next to a more ‘formal’ and ‘pure’

form of scripted theater, or the split “between those who know and those who act” in

anthropology (Kozaitis, 1999, Conquergood, 2002). Like Applied Anthropology, it is

beholden to a textual frame when it is a practice that operates within a living contextual

frame. They are both focused on active development through working with participants.

They both find insights and direction from eliciting and working with collective and
individual narratives. In the realm of performance studies, there has been a call for such

engagement in narratives at the ground level. “… [Ethnographic] knowledge is located,

not transcendent…it must be engaged, not abstracted; and…it is forged from solidarity

with, not separation from the people” (Conquergood, 2002). This is the very essence of

what motivates Applied Improvisation. This active engagement with peoples’ spoken

stories serves one of the main goals of the theory of praxis in that it seeks an engagement

in the social reality and is embedded in the process of social life.

Melanie Harmon is currently the marketing director for a large firm that handles

collegiate ‘travel abroad’ programs, AHA International. She has an M.A. in Theater with

a focus on improvisation. Over the last decade, she has been involved with a couple of

different applied improvisation settings. She worked with Kaiser Permanente in Denver

for the theater outreach wing. Shortly after she signed on, she managed to bring in

Augusto Boal to run a workshop on the techniques of the “Theater of the Oppressed”.

This form of theater is used as a means for bolstering social action through repeated

simulation of difficult social situations where participants are encouraged to take the

place of certain characters in the scenario in order to find alternate solutions to the

situation. This workshop was the catalyst to the formation of an internal office for the

theater outreach program. From here, Melanie utilized improvised theater games and

exercises to help communicate particular theoretical understandings that are taught to

people who perform improvised theater (personal communication, 2006).

Theory in Improvisation: a Digression


From the outside, it may seem peculiar that performers who are ‘cutting up’ on an

improv stage or on the show “Whose Line Is It Anyway?” are not operating on any sort

of theory. Many beginning improvisers enter into classes thinking ‘I just need to be fast

and funny’. They are then introduced to the ‘rules’ in improvisational theater, which are

really more of a core set of values and notions than a hard and fast set of rules.

At the heart of this ethos of improvisation is the notion of ‘agreement’. It stands

at the heart of this art because it is impossible to build anything cohesive and

comprehensible without establishing certain shared realities or ideas. To disagree is to

return to the first step of having to establish something (1.“Hi Mom” 2.”I’m not your

mother”). To keep disagreeing is to keep taking the first step again and again (1. “Oh,

Aunt Trudy. I mistook you for my Mom.” 2. “I’m not your Aunt Trudy, either”). This is

also known as ‘blocking’ or ‘denying’. In agreeing, we are making steps forward

towards something (1.“Hi Mom” 2.“Hello, dear. Have a cookie”). In anthropology, this

may take the form of preliminary research that helps the anthropologist to understand the

situation they will be entering into, a sort of ‘platform’ to build from, or it could be

insights from the data from focus groups and interviews. However, this does not fully

enter into the realm of “shared reality” in that the researcher is also involved. It is more

so the reality of those being studied, but it does allow the researcher to understand the

established reality of those that they’ll be working with, which is an important step

towards a shared reality and understanding. In essence, researchers are trying to

understand the first “Hi Mom” in order to find a response that builds on what is

established and present when they add to the interaction “Hello, dear. Have a cookie”.
The notion of ‘agreement’ is then coupled with the notion of ‘heightening’.

Heightening is often thought of as making something more important through adding

detail, emotional involvement, or some sort of personal stake to what has been

established in the initial phase of an interaction (“A cookie? You’re trying to make me

fat”). An important element to note is that both sides of this interaction are expected to

be working from this same set of rules. On the improv stage, players are expected to

agree and heighten each others’ moves every step of the way to their best ability. This

cooperative element is highly regarded, and showboating or ‘gagging’ is considered ill-

fitting for a ‘good’ improviser. Amongst performers, the most valued performer is one

that concerns themselves with making their partner look good through this process of

agreeing and heightening (Huffaker et al., 2003). The colloquial term for the process of

agreeing and heightening is “Yes, and…”

This focus on agreement and heightening is very close to one of the other facets

of the theory of praxis which is the self-determination of peoples and the actualization of

human potential. In improvisation, each player chooses how they will build things with

their scene partners, and both are supported in that venture if their partner is being

generous and following the rules of improvisation. There are many basic improvisational

exercises that help to highlight these core concepts. These exercises are often introduced

at the beginning of an applied improvisational event in order to 1) create a shared

conceptual frame to work from and 2) provide a visceral example of how these concepts

feel when they are successful (Huffaker, 2006, Harmon, 2006). Julie Huffaker, an

applied anthropologist working for an Applied Improv agency “On Your Feet: Improv for

Business”, suggests that these more basic exercises also create an atmosphere where
greater communication and comprehension can take place because it suspends typical

social norms and hierarchical power dynamics (Huffaker, 2006). She referred to this

state as “Shine”. This notion of bringing the physical and theatrical into Anthropology

has been asserted by other scholars:

“…admitting theater as a source of intercultural knowledge involves recognition,


not only of performative next to informative knowledge, but also of anarchic vs.
hierarchic conceptions of knowledge. Only then can we begin to gain knowledge
of other cultures through participative play” (Fabian, 1999)

Applied Improvisation is the laboratory where these techniques are being

experimented with. Unfortunately, most of the settings that these practices are being

applied are in the development of corporate culture and marketing strategy in western

businesses. The lessons emerging from this work have broad application in establishing

multi-directional feedback relationships and diminishing hierarchic social and

organizational systems. When everyone participates in supporting others with the

understanding that that also supports them, it creates validity for and momentum behind

the notions of collaboration and cooperation.

Of course, there is a risky step in working towards trusting such a process. In the

initial phases of exposure to this system of knowing and acting, there is a realm of

compromise that must be crossed by those who are benefited by a hierarchy. This is one

of the friction points that applied improvisation is often concerned. It shares the same

characteristics of compromises that applied anthropologists may deal with in serving the

interests of their client. One runs a risk when recommending that a client may need to

change their mode of operating in order to improve conditions, or one may need to find a

way to implement an unsatisfying solution. This is the friction point that applied

improvisation has the potential to address for applied anthropologists.


Improvisation also looks at the components of human verbal and physical

interaction as a series of ‘offers’. These offers are what are being exchanged and

enhanced in the process of agreeing and heightening. Offers could be interpreted as the

observational data that applied anthropologists gather in the course of assessing an

organization. Applied Improv would most likely encourage the telling of and then

staging of a typical day or interaction in order to contextualize the offers that are present

in a particular setting to all stakeholders and policy makers. This format is an extremely

effective tool in getting to the heart of particular matters. In Julie Huffaker’s work, she

has used the notions of offers and blocking to contextualize and explore communication

difficulties. Participants would work their way through scenarios where they could

replay a scene/story where they were ‘blocked’ by someone and try different ‘offers’ to

find a solution. The participants were asked to make choices informed by a notion called

‘tilt’, which is thought of as a novel or unexpected way to change an interaction. These

sorts of simulations are powerful tools for developing and investigating the effectiveness

of policy and communication.

Case in point, in staging a typical doctor patient intake exchange at Kaiser

Denver, the participants noted that the doctor was faced away from the patient while

entering prognostic data during the intake, and in the simulation, this was obviously

resulting in missed non-verbal cues that would be very helpful in discerning if there were

other unspoken factors contributing to an illness (stress, depression, etc.). This point was

reached through warming up the participants with improv exercises that introduced

collaborative concepts, then moving them into storytelling exercises, which led to the

staging of particular stories for dramatic exploration which led to the discovery above
and the imagined solution of computers on wall-mounted extender arms to facilitate face-

to-face interaction with the patient (Harmon, 2006). This is now the case in a number of

health-care settings within and outside of Kaiser Denver. The same discovery may have

taken a few days or weeks for an applied anthropologist to observe, interview, and focus

group towards the same end.

In other settings, where larger groups of people are involved in an applied improv

workshop, a small ensemble of actors/presenters is utilized to enact problems/situations.

They are then stopped by a facilitator who asks for alternatives for the scenario to be

acted out. This forum often elicits audible levels of comprehension with participants

discovering unforeseen problems, as well as uncommon solutions (Huffaker, 2006). This

is often a very powerful experience for the participants, but one of the criticisms is that

the effects are rarely long-lasting. A workshop or two fades from memory as people

return to their routine (Booth, 2000). Julie noted that “the feel good stuff tends not to

stick”, but the lessons on communication and discoveries through simulations and replays

tend to stay (Huffaker, 2006).

Applied Anthroprov

However, these tools, exercises, and practices would best serve applied

anthropologists as evaluative tools first and development strategies second. They are

well-suited to be elements for testing the accuracy of data and as a means of iteration in

Rapid Assessment Procedures (Ervin, 2005). The story exercises, as well as the staging

of life, allows for the communities being assessed to play a distinct role in how they are

depicted and understood by the researchers. This fits well with the goals inherent in the
theory of praxis of an interaction between objective knowledge and subjective

experience. It may also be a window into the elements of a culture that may otherwise be

missed in the short time allotted for Rapid Assessment studies by creating a sort of

enhanced cultural lab where the meaningful and emically important portion of a

community’s life are brought forward. Another benefit is that it does not require the

participants to be literate in order to communicate concern or investigate and

communicate solutions. This creates a needed detour around the sorts of textual

hegemony that is at the core of international development.

They could also be heavily incorporated into Participant Action research. Applied

Improv perfectly fits with the mission of PAR in that the people most affected have the

most to say in the ways that their own realities are analyzed and in the courses of action

taken to improve their conditions (Ervin, 2005). The stories of success offered by both

Melanie Harmon and Julie Huffaker support this notion. The concepts of improvisation

offered earlier like ‘agreement and heightening’, seeing interactions as ‘offers’, working

on making the other person look and feel good also feed into developing a productive and

generative set of behaviors that can lead to the sort of autonomy that is hoped for in

Participant Action Research (Ervin, 2005).

Anthropologists are coming at the solution from a somewhat positivist angle, and

improvisers are approaching the solutions from a naturalistic/artistic angle. The driving

forces behind applied improvisation match well with one of Michael Agrosino’s

epistemologies of the culture concept, and that is the “interactionist, which sees culture as

arising in an adaptive manner from people trying to cope with a given social setting in

such a way that they are guided by but not “determined by” a set of assumptions about
proper relations that are, to a greater or lesser degree, shared.” (1999) Communities,

organizations, policy makers, and stake holders have much to benefit from if a union of

these two approaches could occur. It would take a little trust and agreement, as well as

some investigation and research, to make this happen. “Hi, Improv.” “Hello,

Anthropology. Have a cookie.”

Works Cited

Agrosino, Michael. “The Culture Concept and Applied Anthropology” NAPA Bulletin.

18 (1999): 45-65

Booth, Tamzin. “Improvisational Comedy Groups Work to Build Corporate Teams” Wall

Street Journal. 21 July 2000

Conquergood, Dwight, “Performance Studies: Interventions and Radical Research”, The

Drama Review 46, 2, Summer 2002, pp.145-156

Ervin, Alexander M. Applied Anthropology Tools and Perspectives for Contemporary

Practice. 2nd Ed. ed. Boston: Pearson/Allyn and Bacon, 2005. 209-224.

Fabian, Johannes, “Theater and Anthropology, Theatricality and Culture”, The Journal of

Research in African Literatures 30, 4, Winter 1999, pp. 24-31

Harmon, Melanie. Personal interview. 6 June 2006.

Huffaker, Julie. Personal interview. 9 June 2006.

Huffaker, Julie S., Brad Robertson, Gary Hirsch, and Rob Poynton. "Improv Culture:

Using Practices From Improv Theater to Help Organizations Evolve Successfully

Over Time." OD Practitioner 35 (2003): 30-34.


Kozaitis, Kathryn A. “The Rise of Anthropological Praxis” NAPA Bulletin. 18 (1999):

45-65

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