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    Resistance, healing and empowerment through autobiographical therapeutic performance–– 愛，媽媽 (Love, Mum) : a solo matrilineal memoir and autoethnographic inquiry on Chinese womanhood and ‘The good woman’ ideal : a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Creative Writing at Massey University, New Zealand. EMBARGOED until 30 July 2027.
    (Massey University, 2024) Lam, Cynthia Hiu Ying
    My research is an autoethnographic inquiry that employs creative and critical methodologies to examine the question: How does the process of writing and performing one’s life experiences and trauma act as a form of resistance to the dominant ‘good woman’ narrative, leading to personal healing, empowerment and transformation? Through the creation of my one-woman show, 愛，媽媽 (Love, Mum), a matrilineal memoir about three generations of Chinese women, I investigate how the creative process involving the writing, rehearsing and performance of my play can become a form of resistance and counter-storying against the dominant ‘good woman’ narrative, leading to personal healing and empowerment. I begin by discussing the historical context of the virtuous Chinese woman, and present research by scholars who demonstrate that depression in women contains a gendered lens, resulting from the socio-cultural pressures of living up to the ‘good woman’ ideal. My analysis uses the methodological framework of autobiographical/autoethnographic therapeutic performance (ATP). This is a method that focuses on the working through of personal traumatic material through writing and performance. My research utilises a transdisciplinary praxis, combining both arts-based and psychoanalytic theories and practice related to trauma recovery and the healing processes of ATP. My investigation is autoethnographic and deeply personal as my own life experience and creative process is used to answer my research question, as well as shining a light on the socio-cultural structures we live in. Employing a mixture of creative practice, personal reflection, theoretical examination, and a close reading of my play script and performance, I demonstrate how the creative process I went through has led to a form of personal healing and transformation, with the potential to impact and engage with the wider community.
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    "Inbetweeners" : dialogic strategies and practices for writing Arab migration through intercultural theatre : a dissertation presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Creative Writing at Massey University, Wellington, New Zealand
    (Massey University, 2022) Al-Maani, Ammar Sultan Abdullah
    This thesis deploys both critical and creative methodologies to address the research question ‘How can playwriting contribute to an understanding of intercultural experiences, identities, and differences between the Middle East and the West?’ When I began this research journey, as a Jordanian-born Muslim playwright now living in Aotearoa New Zealand, I wanted to write a ‘great Arab theatre’ to capture the potentials and positive outcomes of the immigration experiences of Middle Easterners and Muslims and their transnational movements, re-settlements, and inbetweenness, as well as acknowledge the suffering of a region that has been subjected to generations of colonial trauma and is little understood and deeply stereotyped by the West. I wanted to creatively investigate the ways in which migration, and now a global pandemic that has rewritten our understanding of borders, have both fractured and expanded my viewpoints on myself, my culture, and my birthplace. As I explored scholarly models of trauma, I discovered that they, too, have been characterised by colonial thinking and often deploy limited cultural stereotypes as metaphors to explain and address trauma. None of these models fit my experiences. There are uniquely Arab models of storytelling and performance but, looking at many of the key playwrights from the region showed a deep interweaving of Western playwriting traditions in their work as well. Again, these Western-influenced elements seemed to me in part useful yet ultimately inadequate containers to hold my experiences or grasp the wider backdrop of my region’s complex and contested histories. My goal became to find new, expanded, theatrical forms to initiate a dialogue between concepts of diasporic identity, trauma, conflict, and colonial history in the context of the Middle East and its relationships with its Others - including through the specific trajectory of my own journey and how my subjectivity has been shattered and reformed by multiple transnational relocations. I found it helpful to draw on scholarship about intercultural theatre, but I also developed new models of structure and characterisation that depart from and explicitly reject Western models in novel ways, to try to capture the uniqueness of ‘inbetweenness’ that is symptomatic of my region, myself, and my culture. Linear temporality, fixed characterisation, discrete scene plotting, causal action sequences, character hierarchies, and monolingual, unequivocally purposeful dialogue are all rejected in my playwriting, in favour of forms that I found, through the experiment of writing, better reflected the exploded and shapeshifting terms of identity and experience that I know to be true for myself and many others who have, like me, spanned their lives across continents, cultures, languages, religions, traditions, and histories, then ended up finding it difficult to know what is real. In my playwriting, I wanted to recreate that hybridity of both peaceful and contentious cross-cultural exchange and so I developed a kaleidoscopic metaphor to express a blend of different elements that change perpetually and move disorientingly, yet emerge anew, creatively and beautifully. Deploying my kaleidoscopic model of playwriting both thematically and structurally, I wrote a script that conveyed at least some partial sense of what it might mean to be ‘Arab’ in today’s world, and especially, what it might feel like to be ‘Arab’ in Aotearoa. The research was conducted, and the thesis is submitted, in the discipline of creative writing. It is the playwriting itself that constitutes the research experiment, along with the exegetic material that observes and analyses the act of creation including the aesthetic techniques, sources, and motivations. The thesis thus begins with four critical chapters that set out the background to and rationale for the creative work, then concludes with “Aragoze”, a trilogy of plays that embodies the aims of the research to contribute through both its form and its content to an understanding of intercultural experiences and identities situated in between the Middle East and the West.
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    Performing pūrākau : liberating bodies, healing wairua, and reclaiming ancestral wisdom : a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Psychology at Massey University, Wellington, New Zealand
    (Massey University, 2021) Pearse-Otene, Helen
    Studies by government agencies and advocacy groups report that Māori women and children are more vulnerable to experiencing family violence, sexual abuse, and incest than Pākehā. They acknowledge colonisation and historical trauma as contributing factors, and call for a systems-focused response to tackling sexual violence. This includes providing access to contextually responsive and culturally appropriate interventions. This study initially aimed to explore traditional Māori understandings of incest and healing from sexual trauma that are embedded in the pūrākau (ancestral story) of Hinetītama/Hinenui Te Pō, and her parents, Hineahuone and Tānemahuta. As it would apply a unique Māori theatre pedagogy called Theatre Marae, the project was then expanded to investigate the utility and potential of this innovative approach, which draws together Māori and non-Māori performance traditions, therapeutic models, Māori language, and customs in a process for creative inquiry. In pursuing these two activities, the resulting thesis comprises three publications. In the first article (chapter 2), I unpack the conceptual framework of Theatre Marae pedagogy as a suitable approach for kaupapa Māori (by Māori, for Māori) arts-based research against the backdrop of growing scholarship in Indigenous research and psychologies. In the second article (chapter 3), I deepen this exploration into Theatre Marae and its core methods within an historical account of the theatre company most associated with the practice, Te Rākau. The third article (chapter 4) builds on the preceding chapters by returning to the initial focus of this study and describing how Theatre Marae was applied in a performance-based analysis of this ancient pūrākau as a narrative of survival and healing. The analysis revealed new themes that highlight the collectivist customs of traditional Māori society as protective factors against the proliferation of sexual violence and incest. When drawn together in this thesis, these articles and contextualising discussion illustrate how Māori ancestral knowledge can inform the development of more culturally responsive therapies for recovery from historic sexual trauma. Furthermore, in presenting Theatre Marae to the realm of kaupapa Māori research, this thesis contributes to an international agenda to decolonise research in ways that are emancipatory, healing, and transformative for Indigenous communities.
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    What political and theatrical considerations are required to write a play inspired by Elizabeth Colenso and the Victorian suffragists in order to show the conflicts of emancipation for 21st century women in positions of power : a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Creative Writing in English at Massey University, Manawatu, New Zealand
    (Massey University, 2018) Bushell, Lynnlea
    I am intrigued with the question of whether 21st century liberated women who have broken the glass ceiling are able to sustain positions of power within current social and political contexts. In planning this thesis there were two objectives. Firstly, I wanted to see whether I could write a New Zealand play that showed some aspects of the cost of emancipation through the social and political powers enacted upon both 19th century and 21st century women and create a narrative that would be relatable for a contemporary audience. Secondly, I wanted to reflect on the research and writing process. Stand in Her Shoes has employed both literary and historical research. To be able to write with any understanding of the social and political factors which affected 19th century suffragists and 21st century women in power I have drawn research from books, scholarly articles, photographs, internet databases and the National Library. My thesis essay provides an analysis and overview of my findings. My thesis reports the artistic and dramatic choices made as I shaped my findings Stand in Her Shoes into a theatrical play. I focussed briefly on two seminal plays during my literary research Top Girls by Caryl Churchill, and Bertolt Brecht’s Mother Courage and her Children. I have chosen these two plays to see how they might inform the construction of my female protagonists as well as to enhance my thematic around gender politics. This thesis also provides an overview of the strengths and weaknesses in the play script provided by participants at the first play reading workshop 9 February 2018 at Greytown Little Theatre, South Wairarapa, New Zealand. Finally, I critically reflect on the overall process of writing the play.
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    Encountering tūrangawaewae and whanaungatanga : Māori, interconnection and a place to stand in Kairākau and Aroha Bridge : a thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in Media Studies at Massey University, Manawatū, New Zealand
    (Massey University, 2018) Williams, Kristian
    The establishment of Māori Television, alongside the development of public funding agencies like NZ on Air, and the expansion of media consumption to include online spaces has meant that Māori media has become an increasingly significant presence in the lives of both Māori and non-Māori viewers. However, there remains relatively little research into the ways in which this media can facilitate understanding of te ao Māori. Combining elements of postcolonial theory and kaupapa Māori criticism, this thesis examines the ways in which the textual representations, production practices, and distribution methods of the webseries Aroha Bridge and the television series Kairākau shape an understanding of tūrangawaewae and whanaungatanga. The thesis shows how the textual representations within the two series construct tūrangawaewae and whanaungatanga in complementary but also contrasting ways, providing a place to stand and fostering connections that are, for example, dynamic and informed by tradition, and that value cultural hybridity and autonomy. Through analysis of the production and distribution contexts in which the series are situated, the thesis also highlights the economic, cultural, and technological factors that present opportunities or obstacles for the realisation of tūrangawaewae and whanaungatanga on and off screen. The thesis thus reveals the value of Māori media as a resource for learning about te ao Māori, the ways in which te ao Māori is evolving in the contemporary mediascape, and the structural factors upon which these developments are contingent.
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    Staging Chinese Kiwi voices : Chinese representations in New Zealand theatre : a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in English at Massey University, Albany, New Zealand
    (Massey University, 2019) Lam, Cynthia Hiu Ying
    This thesis explores how Chinese Kiwi theatre makers challenge hegemonic discourses regarding representations of Chinese people in theatre. Up until 1996, narratives and representations of Chinese people in mainstream New Zealand media have been muted, objectified, or confined to fixed stereotypes. In this study, I demonstrate how four contemporary Chinese Kiwi theatre artists have (re)negotiated, reclaimed, and rewritten the subjectivity and narratives of Chinese people in New Zealand. This will be examined within the postcolonial and binational framework that is specific to Aotearoa. Through the examination of specific theatrical works by Lynda Chanwai-Earle, Renee Liang, Mei-Lin Te Puea Hansen, and Alice Canton, I demonstrate how they have challenged hegemonic discourses and Pākehā-narrated histories regarding the Chinese. Their works cover the lives of the early Chinese mining community (referred to as the ‘old Chinese’), to more contemporary representations (the ‘new Chinese’) that involve different sub-sets within the community. The relationship and tensions between Māori, Chinese and Pākehā will be analysed throughout. The subjectivity of Chinese women will also be reclaimed by debunking the stereotype of the ‘Oriental woman’ through matrilineal narratives and autobiography. Finally, the transformative and reconciliatory impact of their works will be examined and dissected. In this thesis, I argue that the work of the Chinese Kiwi artists I explore gestures to the need to negotiate the Chinese place, or ‘non-place’, within the dominant hegemonic narrative. I argue that these artists make strong claims through their work for the bicultural framework that privileges the Māori-Pākehā dialogue to be expanded to include the Chinese voice. I conclude that the Chinese Kiwi theatre artists have propelled the once muted Chinese voice from the margins, and have begun to carve a space into the dominant New Zealand narrative.
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    Shakespeare's Cassius : a critical re-appraisal : a thesis presented in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Philosophy in English at Massey University, New Zealand
    (Massey University, 2015) Alexander, Dean Anthony
    This thesis examines Shakespeare’s characterisation of Cassius in Julius Caesar. Although a faint figure in the historical tradition that Shakespeare inherited, Cassius emerges as the second most prominent character in the play (at least in terms of words spoken). My aim is to explain how (and why) Cassius comes to enjoy such a primary role in the tragedy. In Chapter One, I examine the historical information Shakespeare may have consulted to fashion his Cassius. As I hope to show, Shakespeare adapts and appropriates Plutarch to provide a far more nuanced portrait than the predominantly one-dimensional foil for Brutus. In Chapter Two, I examine the Caesar plays of several contemporary European dramatists (e.g., Muret, Pescetti, and Kyd) to compare their depictions of Cassius to Shakespeare’s. In Chapter Three, I examine Elizabethan England’s influence on Shakespeare’s depiction of Cassius. Additionally, I will explore whether or not Shakespeare sought to connect Cassius with the contemporary figure Robert Devereux, Earl of Essex. The overarching questions that connect these chapters together are: can Cassius be considered the hero or a villain of the play? Is he neither? Is he a “mixed” character? These questions are important, as critics have long been divided over Cassius since the play was first performed. Hopefully, this thesis will show that Cassius is, by the end of the play at least, closer to Vikram Chopra’s “Elizabethan patriot” than he is to any other critical iteration. Shakespeare has created a character who is intelligent, patriotic, and passionate, but also personally vindictive. In short, he is every bit as flawed as every other major character in the tragedy.
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    An information system for psychotherapy research using expert commentary of videotaped expertise : a dissertation presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Information Systems at Massey University
    (Massey University, 1997) Carter, Philip Desmond
    This project looked at the domain of psychotherapy research and asked the question - How can Information System's technology and methods be applied and developed to serve this domain's current needs? Review of the psychotherapy research literature identified 'astute observation and careful description' as the most productive next step in research efforts. As one response, EXpert Commentary of Videotaped Expertise (EXCOVE) was developed as a Knowledge Elicitation (KE) approach. EXCOVE aims to maximise the quality of observation and description of psychotherapy processes. EXCOVE is the collection of expert commentary on specific videotaped, expertexecuted events. This strategy aims to retain the advantages of open questioning, minimise the possibility of copious and inaccurate data, and trigger and bring to consciousness the viewing expert's cognitive processes. Psychodrama was chosen as the psychotherapy of focus. Six psychodrama sessions totalling seven hours were videotaped and at least four expert commentaries on each session were collected using the EXCOVE approach. A computer system was then required to manage this data and to assist in the various qualitative-type analyses envisaged for the data. However, Computer-Assisted Qualitative Data Analysis Software (CAQDAS) were limited in their abilities to meet these requirements. Therefore, a computer system called Flexible Environment for Research And Learning (FERAL) was developed. FERAL's behaviour was modelled on a sheets-of-paper metaphor which is proposed as an improvement to some aspects of existing CAQDAS. The collected data was managed in a FERAL application and various analysis tasks were completed with facilities developed in FERAL. Five psychodrama topics were investigated - phases, doubling, mirroring, unpredictability, and action. Results of the investigations appeared to provide some useful contributions to the understanding of psychodrama. The results also indicated that data collected using EXCOVE and its various mechanisms were useful. FERAL was found to be useful during analysis, particularly the data co-ordination facilities and the sheets-of-paper interface. The project resulted in a working information system for psychodrama that contained a sufficient amount of data to be useful for analysis of various psychodrama topics. The process of developing an information system for this application domain also resulted in the identification of innovations in KE and CAQDAS and their initial verification in a live application.