What the heck is a theatre major doing at an archeological dig in Turkey? Besides quoting sonnets under her breath at weird times and torturing her dig partner (thanks Turco) with the entire Les Miserables cast album, she\u2019s actively working towards her goal of working in the theatre world. I had the option to go to a Shakespeare intensive or to attend this program, and I chose this program not just because it sounded cool (I\u2019m fricking Indiana Jones) but also because I believe this will be more beneficial to me in the long run than a summer of technique work.<\/p>\n
First and foremost, this dig re-emphasizes the value of teamwork. Theatre at its core is ensemble work and empathy, and this dig is helping me strengthen my skills in both. Two weeks in to this weird, tiring, and magical adventure and I feel completely at home with the other Oles. I was worried about finding community as the youngest of the bunch, but this dig has helped me realize that you can find similarities with anyone if you try hard enough. I\u2019m a Sophomore theatre major in a Junior history major\u2019s world, but I\u2019m also a Harry Potter nerd in a group of seven girls who can spend a whole brunch discussing Snape\u2019s morals. I\u2019m an American in a group of Oles who are all dealing with culture shock, and I\u2019m an interested party in a group of Oles and Turks alike who are all here because we have a weird fascination with the tiny sherds of pottery we\u2019re pulling out from under masses and masses of dirt. In theatre you have to work with your ensemble and feel empathy towards your characters no matter how diverse the ensemble is or how different the character is from yourself. In the fast paced environment of this dig, I\u2019ve learned how to find similarities with people even when our differences are incredibly pronounced.<\/p>\n
I\u2019ve also been enthralled with the way this dig has helped me view my body. In theatre my body is my instrument, so I believe my relationship to it is crucial to how I perform. Unfortunately, gender roles are still alive and well in a lot of modern theatre. Growing up, I felt that I had to make myself smaller and weaker in order to be perceived as feminine enough to play to roles I wanted. My body was something to be squeezed into a ball gown or thrown around by a dance partner. Through college theatre I\u2019ve learned that this isn\u2019t a positive way to produce art\u2014I can\u2019t create if I\u2019m constantly worried about how my body looks. However, it can be hard to view your body as a strong thing when you grow up being conditioned to display weakness to get what you want. Here, I\u2019ve had to accept my body as strong. I spend all day throwing rocks off of mountains and shoveling dirt into bent metal buckets. I\u2019ve learned how to properly swing a pick-axe, and I\u2019ve moved rocks that I never would have thought I could budge two weeks ago. As the rallying cry of \u201cYeah Muscles!\u201d (again, thanks Turco) cheers me on, I find my body doing things that a year ago would have seemed superhuman. I walk out of work everyday dirty and sore and unendingly proud of myself. I\u2019ll walk out of this trip a lot more confident in my ability and my body than I walked into this trip, and this confidence will show the next time I take the stage.<\/p>\n
Lastly, I believe that this trip will help with my future in the theatre as it helps me understand how humans relate to space. (I did get this idea from John, so once again, thanks Turco). The first few days I was here I had a really hard time visualizing the floor plan of the supposed building under a pile of dirt, and I had to repeatedly ask Tim to show me how it all connected. I\u2019m still learning, but now I\u2019m having a much easier time visualizing how things come together. In addition, I\u2019ve started to find artifacts within the ruined buildings, and their placement has helped me visualize what the buildings might have been used for. Theatre is all about effectively inhabiting a constructed space so that the space either feels natural or deliberately constructed, and I believe that working on spatial awareness here will help me with that in the long run. If I can imagine ruined spaces as they were thousands of years ago, then it should be easy to imagine that the sets I perform amongst create full and complete worlds where space is important.<\/p>\n
What is the theatre major doing at and archeological dig in Turkey? She\u2019s going out for ice cream and waffles and embracing Turkish culture and spending too much money on fruit, and she\u2019s also working with a team that encourages her to claim her body and explore the space around her. All in all, she\u2019s having the time of her life, and she wouldn\u2019t trade the experience for the world.<\/p>\n
Hadley Evans Nash<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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