(Out)Laws & Justice
Nonprofit organization that offers an eighth-grade interdisciplinary curriculum of history/social studies, language arts and drama. Students to critically reflect on the values that drove U.S. westward expansion and its legacy in their lives. Project culminates in student–written and –performed plays. Based in Los Angeles, Calif.

365 Days 365 Plays
Suzan-Lori Parks' "nationwide grassroots festival": Park's 365 plays (written one a day for one year) performed across the U.S. 11/13/06 through 11/12/07 by hundreds of theater companies in large and small theaters, schoolrooms, storefronts, nursing homes, alleyways, arts organizations, universities. "A shared commitment to putting art at the very center of life - not as a monument but as a daily necessity." Web site has maps, press, networks, forums, plays, applications to join.

52nd Street Project
New York City organization dedicated to matching the inner-city children of Hell's Kitchen with professional theater artists to create original theater.

7 Stages Theatre
Theater in Little Five Points section of Atlanta, Ga., with mainstage productions and eduction program. High-school theater training, Youth Creates, with five-week summer intensive program; residencies at schools year-round; internships for older high-school students and college students; colloquia series for networking and growth in the field. Founded 1979 by Del Hamilton and Faye Allen.

ARTPAD
Initiative of Centre for Applied Theatre Research, University of Manchester, U.K. Training/information resource in theatre-based participatory development techniques. Aimed at NGO workers, focuses on gender and social inclusion, new ways of participation and access to information and decision making. Projects in Brazil and Peru.

About Face Youth Theatre
Chicago theater by/for gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgendered youth and their allies

Abundance Project
Community arts and performance project by Marty Pottenger, the Working Theatre and Snug Harbor Cultural Center in New York, gathering stories and exploring ways that people of different classes, races and ages negotiate economics in their daily lives.

Act/Write
Ongoing collaboration in Chicago, Ill., between Free Street Programs and Columbia College's Fiction Writing Department using theater practices to generate writing. Trains both college teachers and middle-school writing students using Story Workshop techniques.

Actors Theatre Workshop
Volunteer N.Y. theater organization with programs addressing cultural challenges of childhood poverty and inclusive community building. Founded by Thurman E. Scott.

Add Verb Productions
Maine-based touring project using theater to facilitate community response to youth issues (eating disorders, relationship violence, sexual assault). "Play-in-a-Box: Violence Prevention Kit for Youth Action Groups" (2005).

After-school Arts Enrichment
Resource brief on performing arts program at Community Education Resource Center (CERC) at M.S. 67 Queens, N.Y., as example of effective after-school arts enrichment. Reviews consistent participation, inclusiveness, opportunities for student input, leadership, support within the school community, staff teamwork and curriculum. Written by Policy Studies Associates, Inc.; published by The After-School Corporation (TASC), 2001.

Albany Park Theater Project
Ensemble of teenagers creating original theater out of the real-life stories of the Albany Park community in Chicago.

American Alliance for Theatre and Education
Works to promote theater for youth at all levels across America; includes national Theatre in Our Schools campaign.

American Festival Project
Alliance of artists and performing arts companies who work with communities, utilizing culture and the arts as a grounding place and a means for social change. Home base is Appalshop in central Appalachia. Training and mentoring in community-arts techniques.

American Theatre
National community-theater service organization offering festivals, discounts, advocacy, insurance, community-theater database and resource roster.

American Theatre magazine
Monthly magazine published by Theatre Communications Group, with frequent community-arts related articles. Some online features: Forum, Article Archives, subscription info.

Apollo Theater Foundation
Nonprofit organization established in 1991, dedicated to preservation and development of Harlem's Apollo Theater. Apollo Theater Academy: career and leadership skill development through seminars, internships, career days, workshops for New York City and tri-state-region young people.

Applied and Interactive Theater Guide
Lists and links groups working worldwide in drama therapy, psychodrama, sociodrama, playback theater, community-issues theater, Theater of the Oppressed, participatory theater and improvisation.

Art Share Los Angeles
Community arts incubator whose mission is "to shape lives through art, education and community action." Free art classes, 99-seat dance studio and theater, the Warehouse Art Gallery, a computer lab, art studio, classroom spaces and 30 residential lofts for low-income artists. Programs: BLAST (Building Language and Art Skills Together), Community Beautification Program.

Arts & Spirituality Center
Nonsectarian organization in Philadelphia, Pa., founded by a group of artists and spiritual leaders to focus on social and personal healing through interplay of artistic and spiritual expression. Arts After School program, MasterPeace program, Interfaith Youth Poetry Project, Drums for Peace music program and Teens United Performing Arts Project. Has worked with private, charter and public schools, after-school programs, serving primarily low-income, “at-risk” youth. Founded 2000.

Arts Share
Community arts program of the University of Iowa's Division of Performing Arts, School of Art and Art History and Writers' Workshop. Interactive performances, workshops, readings, residencies and master classes statewide by faculty artists and graduate students. School programs, Arts Share Summer Camp, Patient Voice Project offering creative writing classes to chronically ill hospital patients.

Attic Theatre Company
London-based company with contemporary/classic repertoire and outreach programs: Project R, workshops for refugees and asylum seekers (with Company of Angels); plays for senior citizens on Crime Reduction and Home Safety (with Metropolitan Police and Fire Brigade); Young People's Company, 11-14 year-olds in devised-drama workshops.

Banner Theatre Company
Socialist theater company based in Birmingham, England. Documentary theater works based on recordings of dialogue with people in their communities. Roots in radical political theater, popular theater, theater of resistance. Performs to community and trade union audiences in pubs, clubs and community centres and at rallies, festivals and conferences. Founded 1973/4.

Bread and Puppet Theater
"One of the oldest non-commercial self-supporting theaters in the country. Based since 1970 in rural northern Vermont, the theater continues to create shows around political and social themes, and is committed to community engagement, often involving large groups of volunteers in its productions." Founding Director Peter Schumann.

Bringing Nature to Life
Guide to "The Use of Performance Art for Environmental Restoration" by community performance artist Nanda Currant, who works in home school and charter school education programs.

Brooklyn College Art Lab
Arts and technology after-school site in Brooklyn, N.Y., serving some 700 students a year from some 30 high schools, averaging 80-100 students per day. Central node for The Arts Network at Brooklyn College Community Partnership, a creative learning network linking the college to the communities of Brooklyn; programs in seven Brooklyn high schools.

Cardboard Citizens
"The only professional theatre company in the UK working with homeless and ex-homeless people, including refugees and asylum seekers, as creators, participants and audiences."

Carpetbag Theatre
Community-based theater ensemble from Knoxville, Tenn., one of the few African-American professional Directed by Linda Parris-Bailey. Offers training in community arts techniques.

Celeste Miller and Company
A performance artist/choreographer working in communities all over U.S., in schools, with nurses, with mothers and daughters, with teachers. Has outstanding models for working with movement and math, science, social studies. Offers training in community arts techniques.

Center for Children’s Theatre Development
Promotes modern theater for children emphasizing its educational and social role. Established December 2002 in Pristina, Kosova, by young Kosovar playwrights and actors. Workshops, productions. Projects: Theatre for Children – Art and Education and Children’s Mobile Theatre.

Center for Cultural Exchange
Major presenter in Portland, Maine, with ongoing partnerships with Southern Maine's French Canadian, Cambodian, Irish, African-American, African, Greek, Latino, Italian, Jewish, Middle-Eastern and South Asian communities.

Centre for Children's Theatre Development (Kosova)
Children's theater program in arts and education, based in Prishtina.

Children's Peace Theatre
Helps youth explore notions of peace and conflict through the performing arts. Monthly Stone Soup Community Gatherings, conflict-evolution workshops, Sounds Like Peace (music), Art for Change (visual art), Performers for Peace. Directed by founder Robert Morgan in Toronto, Ont., Canada.

Children's Theatre Company
Minneapolis, Minn., resident theater company; adapts children's classics, commissions new works. New-play development lab; Center for Innovation and Theatre Education; Theatre Arts Training program. Directed by Peter Brosius.

City Stage Co. of Boston
Programs for urban children, youth and families in the performing arts: traveling theater company; arts education; interactive exhibits and programs for museums nationwide.

CityStep
Harvard-Radcliffe student organization in partnership with Cambridge, Mass., public schools; undergraduate teams teach fifth-graders self-esteem through dance and theater. Founded1983 by Sabrina Peck.

Clabber, Coal & Ceilidh
Project at Scottish Mining Museum in Newtongrange, May 2006; 170 primary-school children and support staff from four primary schools attended workshops looking at mining life through dance, poetry and drama, song and percussion. Site includes feedback from students, teachers.

Clandestine Insurgent Rebel Clown Army (CIRCA)
Brtish band of clowns doing political street theater.

Collaborative Playbuilding
Will Weigler's site about building plays "with any group that wants to be able to share their perspectives on local issues and speak out to their community throuh performance."

Comin' On Over: The Legacies of Urban Bush Women
A "hyperessay" (online, nonlinear essay with Internet hyperlinks) - by Ananya Chatterjea, Ahree Lee and the Walker Art Center -- about the dance-theater company Urban Bush Women.

Common Weal Community Arts
Nonprofit organization based in Saskatchewan, Canada, that uses art as a tool for social development. Founded in early '90s by artist Rachael Van Fossen using the "community play" format to promote social and cultural understanding among diverse communities. Expanded mandate in 1998 to include other participatory art media and support other organizations through an advisory role.

Community Engaged Theatre in Canada & Beyond
Canada-based Web site exploring connections among theater, performance, community development and civic engagement. Ten downloadable articles.

Community Performance Project
Online resources about community-based performance in Greater Baltimore, the Mid-Atlantic region and around the world. Explores connections between theater and “staging areas”: education, community building, activism, environmental education, civic engagement, international contexts, artistic entrepreneurship, cultural work and other artistic disciplines.

Community Performance, Inc.
Production team creating community-based, site-specific theatrical productions that rebuild and rediscover community through the power of storytelling, led by Richard Owen Geer, founding director of Swamp Gravy. Offers training in community arts techniques.

Cornerstone Theater Company
L.A.-based company that builds bridges between and within diverse communities; work often includes first-time community collaborators alongside experienced professionals in new adaptations of classic texts. Offers internship training in community arts techniques.

Creating Community Based Dialogue
Extensive essay by Headlines Theatre Director David Diamond, discussing approaches to using cultural work as a community-development tool responding to issues of globalization. On Headlines Web site.

Critical Breakdown
Hip-hop activist program committed to engaging young people in social change. Based in Boston, Mass., and supported by American Friends Service Committee. Monthly open mics, conferences, participation in rallies, protests and marches

Cry of the Rooster Theater
Seattle-based performing arts collective using puppets, music in provocative presentations of world folklore; organized high-school students for the 1999 Seattle demonstration against the World Trade Organization.

Cultural Odyssey
Arts organization run by artists Idris Ackamoor, producer of San Francisco's African American Performance Festival, and Rhodessa Jones, director of the Medea Project: Theater for Incarcerated Women. Offers training in community arts techniques.

Cycle Circus
Touring group of puppeteers, circus performers, bicycle builders and educators traveling by bicycle to create community events for social change. Festivals, street performances, college residencies. Collaborations with community gardens, Mexican workers associations, refugee camps.

DAH Theatre Research Center
Arts center in Belgrade, Serbia and Montenegro. "A place that can empower people in facing the difficulties of society in transition." Home of DAH Teatar.

Dance Mission Theater
San Francisco-based organization including Dance Brigade, a six-member professional women's socio-political, dance-theater and drumming company; annual events showcasing emerging and established Bay Area choreographers; instructional dance program serving adults and youth; 140-seat Dance Mission Theater; rentals. Includes GRRRL Brigade, a dance, theater and taiko drumming company for girls ages 13 and up; and Junior GRRRL Brigade for ages 9-12; both perform regularly in Bay Area for school assemblies, demonstrations, conferences. Also GRRRLs Dance Camp, summers.

De-ba-jeh-mu-jig Theatre Group
Professional, community based, theater in Northern Ontario, Canada, dedicated to the vitalization of the Anishnaabeg culture, language and heritage. National Aboriginal Arts Animator Program offers theater training, with special program to help those who wish to return to their own communities to work.

Dead Man Walking School Theatre Project
Offers stage rights to Tim Robbins' play "Dead Man Walking" to high schools and colleges who agree to incorporate the issue of the death penalty into their curriculum in two academic departments. Web site offers dozens of tools for play production and discourse on the subject, including a blog, on-campus initiatives, local outreach and national and regional links. An initiative of the Death Penalty Discourse Network.

Dell'Arte Players
Home of Dell'Arte Players, Dell'Arte International School of Physical Theatre, Mad River Festival and Education Through Art. Located in Blue Lake, Calif., and devoted to development of "Theatre of Place." Offers training in community arts techniques.

Democracy Onstage
Ford Foundation report on the work of Augusto Boal and Theatre of the Oppressed in Brazil. By n.Y.Times writer Christopher Reardon, 20001.

Dramatic Action: Community-Engaged Theatre in Canada & Beyond
Web site exploring connections between theater, performance, community development and civic engagement. Offers overview of the community-engaged theatre “movement” over the past 20 years. Articles by Esther Farmer, Dan Friedman, Dale Hamilton, Ted Little, et al.

E-race
Qualitative and quantitative examination of the goals and objectives of "e-race," a performance and dialigue project by MISCELLANEOUS Productions of Richmond, B.C., Canada. Charts the project's exploration of youth's obsession with "speed," investigating growth and integration of cast members and audiences' reaction to the live performance and attitudinal changes over time. Written by Tristin Wayte and George Tien; published by MISCELLANEOUS Productions, 2005.

El Teatro Campesino
Chicano Farmworkers Theater, organized in 1965 to support Cesar Chavez's farmworkers movement in California. Newsletter, store, history.

Emergency Exit Arts
U.K.-based team of artists producing celebratory events: spectacular performances, fireworks, arts-in-education and community-arts events, processions, character walks, street bands, floats.

FADO Performance
Canadian artist-run "centre without walls," producing public art and performances exploring regional geography and identity, like performances with community choirs in Toronto's subways, and in slum apartments in gentrifying neighborhoods.

Flint Youth Theatre
Program of Flint, Mich., Community School District and resident company of Bower Theater in Flint Cultural Center. Community-created new works on social issues, intergenerational programming, drama school, Learning Through Theater for school audiences.

Fluid Movement
Community performance group in Baltimore, Md.

Fountainhead: Black International Cinema
International, intercultural organization based in Berlin, Germany, producing annual film festival, weekly television program, publications, cinema distribution, dance theater.

FreeStreet
Focuses on Chicago's marginalized young people, using the performing arts. TeenStreet Theater employs teens to create boundary-breaking theater; Arts Connect trains medical students to provide arts relief for chronically ill children.

GTC Dramatic Dialogues
Chicago-based Intervention theater, using interactive, issue-oriented theater programs to address sexual communication, date rape, racism, sexism, homophobia and substance abuse. (Formerly Gestic Theatre Company.)

Gas & Electric Arts
Philadelphia-based theater company that offers Boal-technique "Surge" workshops for negotiating conflict and building community, and "Generating: Real Stories Real People" storytelling and wine-tasting events at local restaurant. Founded by Lisa Jo Epstein and David Brown.

Gateway Performance Productions
Innovative Atlanta-based mask theater company directed by Sandra Hughes, with a commitment to theater for youth, arts-in-education and family audiences.

Geese Theater Company (U.S.)
"Drama therapy in criminal justice." Historic company providing training in drama therapy with violent and sex offenders; drama and art work as restorative justice mediators. Projects in seven countries, including Roumania. Founded1980 by John Bergman.

Geese Theatre Company (U.K.)
Prestigious company working within Criminal Justice System. Performances, workshops, groupwork in prisons, special hospitals and probation encouraging self-awareness and exploring change. Founded 1987, based on Geese Theater U.S.A.

Global Site Performance
Site-specific community choreographer Marylee Hardenbergh's organization, based in Minneapolis, Minn. Large performances with community members, including cancer patients and their caregivers, seniors, homeless men, mothers & daughters. Sites include Mississippi River, rivers, lakes, bridges, boats, large machines. Includes One River Mississippi, performed by hundreds along the river in 2006.

Google Shakespeare
Google site that allows users to browse through the full texts of William Shakespeare's 37 plays. Allows key word search. Links to related scholarly research, Internet groups, videos of theater performances of plays (including amateur videos and BBC's "60 Second Shakespeare" submissions by the general public). Part of Google Book Search.

Grassroots Theatre Company
Zimbabwe performing arts organization from Bulawayo, South West Zimbabwe, specializing in theater for development using dance, drama and music as a process for informing and empowering local communities in Zimbabwe and overseas.

Great Leap
Performing-arts organization dedicated to principles of deepening race relations and promoting harmony between diverse cultural groups. School, youth programs. Rooted in Asian-American community of Los Angeles, Calif. Directed by Nobuko Miyamoto.

Guerrilla Performance Locator
Map of iconoclastic works by artist and activists and the political issues and ideas they are bringing attention to.

Harlem Stage
New York organization that supports creation and development of new works by performing artists of color. Forum for culturally diverse artists, community-based performing arts organizations and regionally significant arts groups. Performances for Harlem residents at affordable prices. Education programs: family workshops, performance study guides, Harlem Stage in the Schools.

HartBeat Ensemble
"Theater for active change" in Hartford, Conn., founded by former members of San Francisco Mime Troupe. Mainstage plays, street theater, plays in Hartford city parks, educational workshops for children and aduts in using theater for social change with Boal techniques. Partnerships with Two Way Youth Employment Program in Hartford’s North End and the Amistad Youth Project in Hartford's South End.

Headlines Theatre Company
Canadian issue-oriented company whose Theatre for Living is based on August Boal's Theatre of the Oppressed. Boal-technique training programs. Directed by David Diamond.

Hearts&Minds
Scottish charity that aims to promote the quality of life for children and elders in hospital and hospice care through the performing arts.

Hemispheric Institute of Performance and Politics
Consortium of institutions, artists, scholars and activists dedicated to exploring the relationship between performance and social and political life in the Americas and provide "a better understanding of the many shared histories and practices in the Americas that defy national borders." Hemispheric annual course, annual Encuentros/Seminars, digital archive, Web Cuadernos, forums and newletter. Based at New York University.

Here and Now: Recommendations to Social Service Agencies in the Lower Mainland
Community Action Report on Headline's Theatre's "Here and Now" performance project about gang violence. Headlines' Community Scribe, Kashmir Besla, attended every performance, gathered audiences' interventions and mapped them out different general themes. Offer recommendations as a grassroots point of reference to any social-service agencies or community organizations that want to advance programs tackling issues attached to gang violence. downloadable as a .pdf from healines Web site. Produced November 16 – December 11, 2005, and published January 3, 2006, by Headlines Theatre. A Cross-Sector Resource.

Home land security
Community arts performance project created by Marty Pottenger, commissioned by Center for Cultural Exchange, Portland, Me. Civic-dialogue project in response to post-9/11 immigrant and refugee sweeps in Maine. Attempt to foster connections between radical left and right elements of the area. Site has performance excerpts, videos, reviews, plus related history and politics info.

Hospital Audiences
Provides arts programs to New Yorkers who "are isolated from the cultural mainstream," including people in hospitals, shelters, prisons, etc. Exhibitions of art by self-taught artists with mental disabilties. Cultural events, workshops, prevention education, youth leadership, advocacy, schools programs. Founded 1969 by Michael Jon Spencer.

INNER VOICES: Social Issues Theatre
Addresses social/health issues pertinent to college experience through performances on and off campus, with facilitated discussions. Sponsored by McKinley Health Center, Counseling Center and Theatre Department at the University of Illinois, Urbana Champaign.

ImaginOn
Collaborative venture of the Public Library the Children's Theatre of Charlotte, N.C., occupying entire city block. Library, museum, theater, Story Lab, Tech Central, Teen Loft, classes.

Imagination Workshop
California theater artists working with at-risk children in schools, psychiatric patients and homeless individuals.

In Place of War
Research project exploring the relationship between performance and war. Concerned with theater in refugee camps, in war-affected villages, in towns under curfew. Founding director: James Thompson. Supported by Arts and Humanities Research Council, which funds research and postgraduate study inU.K.'s higher education institutions.

Independent Street Arts Network
Independent group of presenters and promoters of street arts throughout the U.K. Networking, information sharing, collaboration, lobbying, training and advocacy.

InteractiveTheatre.org
Resource for educational Interactive Theatre, where performers interact with audiences as core part of performance. Special focus on using drama to educate about sexual assault.

International Playback Theatre Network
Association of Playback supporters, practitioners and groups. Everything you need to know about Playback. Journal, newsletter, calendar.

Involvement in the Arts and Human Development: General Involvement and Intensive Involvement in Music and Theater Arts
Study analyzes relationship between arts involvement and youth development, using National Educational Longitudinal Survey as a tool. Followed 25,000+ American secondary-school students for 10 years. Found: correlation between general involvement in arts and positive academic achievement; correlation between high levels of participation in music and high achievement in math; correlation between sustained participation in theater arts and number of positive youth development traits. By James S. Catterall, Richard Chapleau, John Iwanaga (In Champions of Change, the Arts Education Partnership and the President's Committee on the Arts and Humanities, 1999).

Irondale Center for Theater, Education, and Outreach
Community arts center in former church in Brooklyn, N.Y., operated by Irondale Ensemble Project, a theater ensemble with the goal to "discover how theater can be utilized as an important or central aspect of daily life." Theater productions, education programs, classes, community-based theater programs, professional development workshops for teachers, teaching artist intensives.

Irondale Ensemble Project
New York company dedicated to theater as educational tool for fostering social change.

Jana Sanskriti
Cultural organization based in Calcutta, India. Supports 32 community theater groups in West Bengal that are using Theatre of the Oppressed techniques to write and present plays about alcoholism, dowry deaths and the accountability of panchayats, or village councils. Directed by Sanjoy Ganguly. Subject of a French TV documentary by Julian Boal.

John Michael Kohler Arts Center
A 100,000-square-foot visual and performing-arts complex devoted to innovative explorations in contemporary art; new models for community arts; educational partnering with an emphasis on early-childhood education; presenting performing artists; supporting practicing artists through residencies and fellowships. Complex includes ten galleries, theater, interdisciplinary performance space, studio-classrooms, meeting spaces, gift shop and café. Community Arts Department, a programming department at the Arts Center has five programs: Connecting Communities, The ARTery, the Community Gallery, the Partnership Program and Community Events.

Jumblies Theatre
Canadian theater company that sets up multi-year residencies in urban neighborhoods and creates art with and about that community. Includes workshops, performances, installations, festivals, more. Founded by Ruth Howard in 2001; based in the Community Play Movement introduced in Canada in 1980 by Dale Hamilton. Site has links to articles about community-engaged theater.

Jump-Start Performance Company
Theater company and presenter in San Antonio, Tex., focusing on issues of race, class and gender preference. Offers training in community art techniques.

Junebug Productions
New Orleans-based performance organization that develops artistic work focusing on African Americans in the Black Belt South; formerly Free Southern Theater. Directed by John O'Neal. Offers training in community art techniques.

Juneteenth Legacy Theatre
African-American theater company for social change, based in Louisville, Kentucky. Founded by Lorna Littleway.

Lauren Elder & Co.
Arts company working in all media in public housing, public structures, teens & technology, community parks and school gardens. Based in San Francisco Bay Area.

Light Box/Out of the Box
Community based educational outreach activities by Florida presenter Miami LIght. Masters classes, residencies in Miami-Dade County Public High Schools.

Littleglobe Inc.
Artist-run nonprofit based in Santa Fe, N.M., dedicated to "collaborative creative projects in new contexts." Integrates expermental creative approaches with projects that foster civic dialogue and individual empowerment toward social and environmental health and healing. Projects with women at Creative Center for women with Cancer; with residents of a sheltered housing project in Ireland for European Union Festival of Culture; with intergenerational group bridign cultural, geographic, generational and eocnomic boundaries with Santa Fe Opera. Founded by Chris Jonas and Molly Sturges, artist in residence for Santa Fe Opera Outreach projects.

Liz Lerman Dance Exchange
National performance company and "school for movement arts and art movements, meshing people across generations, disciplines and styles," based in Takoma Park, Md. Offers training in community art techniques. Moving Dialogues: discussions on the intersections of the arts with other disciplines. Teen Exchange: artistic immersion program for Washington, D.C. area youth between the ages of 13 and 17 (includes The Rick Project).

Los Angeles Bus Riders Union
"One of the largest mass-transit, anti-racist organizations it the U.S." fighting for a "first-class, clean-fuel, bus-centered public transportation system in Los Angeles." Uses "teatro" (theater) for organizing.

Los Angeles Poverty Department (LAPD)
First performance ensemble in U.S. made up principally of homeless people. Artwork "connects lived experience to the social forces that shape the lives and communities of people living in poverty. LAPD is dedicated to building community on Skid Row, Los Angeles." Directed by John Malpede.

Lovewell Institute for the Creative Arts
Based at Nova Southeastern U. in Ft. Lauderdale, Fla., develops new musicals with teens during summer workshops, in partnership with local youth organizations. Has community-based interdisciplinary arts degree program. Directed by David Spangler.

Lysistrata Project
Theater project in protest against expected 2003 war against Iraq.

M.I.K.E.
Traveling recording studio/performance stage created in 2006 by artists Richard Saxton of the municipalWORKSHOP and Stuart Hyatt of TEAM Records with 100 community participants in Sheboygan, Wisc. Created from a grain bin and salvaged camper and truck parts; available for travel on flatbed semitruck trailer to communities throughout the U.S. Focal point of a 2006 Connecting Communities residency at John Michael Kohler Arts Center.

Macnas
Physical theater in Ireland doing community plays and parade work. Toured with U2.

Making Books Sing
Children's theater and arts-education organization. Productions based on outstanding contemporary children's books that honor children - their struggles growing up, their cultural diversity and their intellect. School-based artist residencies, professional-development programs for teachers, teacher's resource curriculum packets, parent-child workshops. Based in New York, N.Y.

Mandala Center for Change
Multidisciplinary education organization dedicated to community dialogue, social justice and personal transformation and for training and grassroots practice of Augusto Boal's Theatre of the Oppressed. Based in Port Townsend, Wash.

Mandorla Creative
Performance company using principles of Gestalt practice, group process, Playback Theater and western theater in working with communities. Professional training and development; personal-development workshops; commissioned creative projects. Directed by Dawn Miller, drama therapist. Based in Bristol, England.

Martha Bowers Dance Theater Etcetera
New York based performance company bringing community members and professional artists together as performers in site-specific works that deal with issues relevant to the surrounding community. Offers training in community art techniques.

Mass Transit Street Theater & Video
Based in Bronx, New York. Documentary video on Northwest Bronx Neighborhood Coalition: "Passin' It On: 25 Years of Oraganizing the Northwest Bronx." Theater explores loss of community, home and homelessness, value of diversity.

Matrix Theatre Company
Detroit, Mich., company specializing in large puppets and bilingual community programs for children, teens and adults in playwriting, performance, radio and community-based theater.

Mind the...gap
Innovative performance company based in Bradford, England. Includes work with people with physical, sensory or learning disabilites, low literacy and mental-health histories. Programs include Drama Club, Summer School, Musical Arc and Youth Theatre.

Miscellaneous Productions
Vancouver nonprofit interested in merging "the new frontiers of performance and new media"with community development and popular culture.

Mississippi Cultural Crossroads
After-school program since 1976 that trains young people to document life in Claiborne County, Miss. Has Peanut Butter and Jelly Theater, troupe of seven high-school students who do stage productions promoting literacy. Also Young Person's Cultural Exchange program.

Missoula Children's Theatre
America's largest touring children's theater, using participation in the performing arts to develop creativity, social skills, goal achievement, communications skills and self-esteem; in Missoula, Montana.

Mortal Coil Performance Society
All-female stilt company offering "larger than life images" for community celebrations, festivals and parades; based in Vancouver, B.C., Canada.

Mosaic Model for Youth Development through the Arts
Three-year study on Mosaic Youth Theatre of Detroit and its methods, The study identifies and assesses the internationally acclaimed, professional performing arts training program’s goals, practice methods, and expected outcome. Conducted by University of Michigan Department of Psychology, The Detroit Initiative and Detroit-area community-based organizations; published by Mosaic Youth Theatre of Detroit, 2008. Downloadable.

Mosaic Youth Theatre of Detroit
Performing-arts training program designed to achieve "youth development through the arts." Theatrical and musical performances by National Touring Company; Next Stage Company creates and performs original pieces through local commissions; Mosaic Acting Company; Mosaic Singers. Education Department, classes (English and Spanish), school and summer programs. Many local and national partners.

Music Theatre Workshop
Youth-arts development organization teaches disadvantaged young people writing, producing, and performing original musical theater inspired by personal stories. Works in schools, parks and juvenile prisons in metro Chicago area. Programs: Teens Together; Fabulous Females (for young women incarcerated at Illinois Youth Center at Warrenville); Temporary LockDown (storytelling, movement, drumming workshops for young men/women students at Nancy B. Jefferson Alternative School, Cook County Juvenile Detention Center. Founded 1984 by Meade Palidofsky.

NC Women's Prison Writing and Performance Project
Weekly workshops in writing and performance. Public performances by Women�s Prison Repertory Company. Based at Jordan Institute for Families at School of Social Work of UNC-Chapel Hill.

NIEHS Public Forum & Toxics Assistance and Translational Theatre Outreach & Education at UMTB Galveston
Community environmental forum theater addressing 21st Century environmental challenges to families and their communities. Program of National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences Center in Environmental Toxicology at The University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston; focuses on the needs of Gulf Coast Texas communities.

Nana Projects
Company of lanterneers and "visual alchemists" creating public spectacles. Best known for an annual Baltimore community event, The Great Halloween Lantern Parade. Offers Parade School training program for artists, community organizers and college students interested in the artistry of community-based parades. Directed by Molly Ross; originally founded in Minneapolis as Theater Nana in 1992.

National Performance Network
Supports touring by established and emerging performing artists, with emphasis on community-based residencies.

New WORLD Theater
Visionary presenter and producer of works by playwrights of color, "purposely blurring the lines between professional and community, art and politics, scholarship and activism;" in residence at UMass. Offers training in community arts techniques.

NiteStar Program
Drama, music and peer-education for pre-adolescents, adolescents and young adults living with HIV/AIDS. Includes direct service, training and technical assistance. Productions created by members of the company, with followup workshops, heighten awareness, provide accurate information and help to reduce risky behaviors. Founded by Dr. Cydelle Berlin in 1987. Located at St. Luke's Roosevelt Hospital Center, New York City, N.Y.

Open Door Theatre
Theater based in Everett, Wash., that "frees children from violence and abuse by teaching safety skills through dramatic live performances." Has in-school programs and teachers' handbooks.

Opera House Arts
Community arts space at Stonington Opera House in historic building in Deer Isle, Maine. Performances, new works based in local oral histories, community playreading series, documentaries on local culture and practices, family theater-arts series, local site-specific projects. Carol Estey, Judith Jerome, co-artistic directors. Founded by Linda Pattie.

Pale Girl in the African Sun
Theater artist Maureen Towey's documentation of her year in South Africa as a Fulbright Scholar researching how performance can help re-imagine community identity. Includes slide shows and journal.

Pangea World Theater
Minneapolis, Minnesota-based theater company employing a cross-ethnic vision of tolerance and humanrights through excellence in the arts.

Paperhand Puppet Intervention
Uses cardboard, papier-m�ch�, trash and a variety of puppetry styles to help promote "social change, peace and hope for a better world." Community collaborations. Based in Saxapahaw, N.C.; directed by artists Donovan Zimmerman and Jan Burger.

Paprika Theare Festival
Annual juried festival in Toronto, Ont., Canada, presenting new theater works written, directed, acted, designed and stage managed by young artists under the age of 21. Founded by Anthony Furey in 2002; runs for two weeks every March.

Paving the way
Study mapping the youth-and-participatory-theater sector with baseline assessment of activity across England. Summarizes findings of an extensive mapping study, regional mapping reports and case-study research. Commissioned to inform development of the Young People's Participatory Theatre project a three-year initiative (2005/06 - 20008/09), funded by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS). By Arts Council England in partnership with National Association of Youth Theatres, 2007.

Peace Child Israel
Nonprofit group based in Tel Aviv that has used theater to teach tolerance and mutual respect to Arab and Jewish teenagers.

Pedagogy and Theatre of the Oppressed
Focuses on ideology and methods of Paulo Freire, Augusto Boal, liberatory educators, activists and community organizers. Based in Omaha, Neb.; has annual national conference.

People's Palace Projects
NGO with arts/human rights projects. In Brazil: "Changing the Scene" in/outside juvenile justice system in Rio and "Staging Human Rights" in prisons across five states. In U.K.: "Lives Online" year-long performance, visual-art and Web-design program with teenagers excluded from school.

Performing Arts Research Coalition (PARC)
Three-year audience-research project on culture-going habits of citizens in ten U.S. cities, confirming that people attend performing arts-related events more than sporting events and place a high value on presence of performing arts near where they live, work, and seek cultural outlets. By Urban Institute (Opera America et al, 2004).

Performing Communities: The Grassroots Ensemble Theater Research Project
Study of ensemble theater deeply rooted in eight U.S. communities for 10 to 35 years. Lays down a base of 86 interviews with these diverse artist ensembles and their communities, then layers it with comments by the site visitors and critical writing by experts in the field of community-based arts. Also included are theater profiles, photo galleries, play excerpts and documentary resource inventories. By Robert H. Leonard, Ann Kilkelly, Jan Cohen-Cruz, Linda Frye Burnham, et. al., Published online by Community Arts Network, 2002. (Published in paperback by New village Press, 2006.)

Performing the World
International community of people who recognize performance as a powerful developmental activity for social-cultural transformation. International conferences.

Perseverance Theatre
Artist-driven organization dedicated to developing Alaskan artists from all backgrounds and cultivating Alaskan audiences for a broad range of work. Founded in 1979 by Molly Smith.

Playmaking for Girls
Program of Synchronicity Performance Group in Atlanta, Ga. Detention Center workshops, public performances, after-school program, satellite workshops min middle and high schools, extensive community partnerships.

Playwrights Project
Enlightened playwriting program for kids and older people, based in San Diego, Calif.

Pregones Theater/Teatro Pregones
Grassroots ensemble committed to new theater in popular traditions of Latino/Puerto Rican American community. Based in New York's South Bronx.

Prison Creative Arts Project
Committed to original work in the arts in Michigan correctional facilities and juvenile detention centers, presenting prison artists in theate and dance performances and visual art; exhibits are online. Directed by Buzz Alexander.

Procession of the Species
Annual artistic wildlife pageant in Olympia, Wash.; model for dozens of other Processions worldwide.

Public Dreams Society
Canadian organization creating celebrations with community participation, including Illuminares, the Circus of Dreams and the Parade of Lost Souls.

Puerto Rican Traveling Theatre
Bilingual New York theater with mainstage productions; free summer performances in barrios, plazas, parks, and other public spaces; Playwright's Unit. Raúl Juliá Training Unit: free after-school program with structured arts-education curriculum and performance classes forlow-to-moderate income Latino and other minority youth in all NYC boroughs. Founded 1967 by Miriam Colón Valle, "helped launch the Spanish bilingual theater movement."

Random Acts Theatre Company
London-based Playback Theater Company specializing in "celebrating peoples' stories through spontaneous theatre."

Red Dive
New York-based artist team creating interactive events and guided performance-tours in unusual environments, "a radical re-envisioning of how and where art is presented." Founded by Maureen Brennan.

Roadside Theater
New (2001) Web site for the Central Appalachian community-based theater company. Has full press kit, plus a Reading Room with articles about Roadside, grassroots theater and the Appalachian region.

Robert E. Gard Foundation
Dedicated to preserving the legacy of Robert E. Gard, founder of the Wisconsin Idea Theater and father of the U.S. grassroots theater movement

Scrap Mettle SOUL
Community-performance organization based in Chicago, Ill., founded by Community Performance Inc.

Senior Artist Project
Grant program supporting educational, mentoring and therapeutic community projects conducted by literary, visual or performing artists 55 and older in northern San Diego or southern Orange counties in California. Provides stipends and expenses. Project of the Kenneth A. Picerne Foundation,

Senior Theatre Connections
Information about field of senior theater, with news, bookstore and links to performing groups and other professionals. Run by Bonnie L. Vorenberg, author of the comprehensive directory Senior Theatre Connections.

Smashing Times Theatre Company
Dublin theater company that provides expertise and training in community-based theater throughout Ireland. Prioritizes work with groups experiencing social and economic disadvantage, reflecting a belief that drama can be a catalyst for personal and community development.

Sojourn Theatre
Portland, Ore., based theater makes original mainstage productions; community collaborations around the nation and touring shows. Founded by Michael Rodh, director of Hope Is Vital.

Southern African Theatre Initiative
"The Voice and Soul of Theatre in Southern Africa." Regional organization formed by theater practitioners for development of theater in Southern Africa. Network iscentral co-ordinating body for Theatre in 14 countries that make up the Southern African Development Community. Networking, workshops, research, festivals. Site has extensive database of theater organizations in region.

Spare Tyre Theatre Company
London-based company making musical theater from personal stories with women fleeing domestic violence, elders and young people with and without learning disabilities, experiencing homelessness and who identify as gay, lesbian or bisexual.

Spiral Q Puppet Theater
Theater founded in 1996 by Matthew (Mattyboy) Hart, using giant puppets and pageantry "to mobilize communities, empower marginalized people and illuminate the victories, frustrations and possibilities of living in the neighborhoods of Philadelphia."

Stage Left
Grass-roots community-development and social-action performance company based in Calgary, Alb., Canada, "engaging in professional artist-community collaboration." Uses Popular Theater, Theatre of the Oppressed and interdisciplinary Performance Creation techniques. Works extensively with people with physical, sensory, learning and/or developmental disability, brain injury, chronic illness and/or mental illness; lesbigay youth; street-involved youth; politically motivated youth; culturally diverse youth; Ethno-cultural communities; First Nations; and other marginalized communities and their allies ". Recognized for advancing the global disability culture movement, developing Performance Creation Canada network, and conducting Theatre of the Oppressed-based social-justice work. Annually produces Balancing Acts: Calgary's Annual Disability Arts Festival.

Stand and Unfold Yourself: A Monograph on the Shakespeare and Company Research Study
Harvard's Project Zero studied two seasons of 20-year-old professional theater company's school-education programs. Asked: (1) Why do these programs work so well? (2) What are participants are actually learning? (3) What is critical to success of these programs? Found arts provide ideal setting for "profound learning experiences" in high levels of literacy, social and personal growth and development, and development of higher-order thinking skills. By Steve Seidel (In Champions of Change, the Arts Education Partnership and the President's Committee on the Arts and Humanities, 1999).

StreetSigns Institute
Trains teachers in arts-integrated curricula based on performance of literature. Produces educational touring productions and curricular materials. Part of StreetSigns Center for Literature and Performance in Chapel Hill, N.C.

Stuart Pimsler Dance & Theater
Minneapolis, Minn.-based company that includes "Caring for the Caregiver," helping healthcare professionals find expression for complex emotional issues encountered in their work.

Swamp Gravy
Georgia's official "folklife play," based on the small town of Colquitt's oral history and performed by the people who live there; outstanding example of new community theater. Has Swamp Gravy Institute for community theater training.

Synchronicity Performance Group
Atlanta-based women's performance ensemble with "Playwriting for Girls" program at youth detention centers. "Women + War" project.

TOPLAB
Theatre of the Oppressed Laboratory, based in work of Augusto Boal. Conducts on-site training workshops on theater as an organizing tool for activists in neighborhood, labor, peace, human rights, youth and community-based organizations. Based in New York City.

TOVA
Artistic Projects for Social Change. Compny that creates performs artistic projects that speak to issues of social change: collaborative Theater of Witness productions, videos, workshops and educational programs. Based in Philadelphia, Pa.

Teaching Theatre
Educational Theatre Association’s quarterly journal for theater educators. Typically includes an articles on acting, directing, playwriting or technical theater; profiles outstanding educational theater programs; pieces on curriculum design, assessment or teaching methodology; reports on current trends or issues in the field, such as funding, standards or certification.

Teatro Vision
Theater ensemble based in San Jose, Calif.; founded in 1984 by members of Women in Teatro (a statewide network of Chicano theaters). Dedicated to Teatro Chicano as a force for social change. Includes school and neighborhood programs and training.

The After-Play Interactive Forum
Playwright Laurie Brooks reinvents the post-performance "talk-back," blending Boal techniques, Dorothy Heathcote's drama strategies of and values clarification. Models, examples, consulting, workshops.

The Connies
Australian performance troupe of former tramway conductors. "Connies bring a yarning, poetic and singing trammie tradition, dress in uniforms that span the eras of tram fashion and swing beautifully crafted conductors leather bags. Connies produce tickets in the form of swap cards that track environmental, cultural, social, historical, and tramway themes. We educate and inform. Original artwork, performances and themes are created as required." Organized by Robert D'Andrea.

The Drama Review (TDR)
Theater journal edited by Richard Schechner at New York University. Often covers community-based theater.

The Gathering Space
Community-based arts project in Junction neighborhood of Toronto, Ont., Canada, led by artist Loree Lawrence. Works with residents to gather stories, images, and text and leave traces of artwork throughout the neighborhood. Indoor and outdoor installations, ephemeral performances, public workspace and gallery at 2804 Dundas St. West, shared with Cool Hand of a Girl Coffee Shop.

The Puppeteers Cooperative
Artists and puppeteers working in U.S. cities "to create giant puppet parades, pageants, and ceremonies of celebration and complaint, using simple materials and movements to build community cardboard extravaganzas." Founded 1976 by (the late) George Konnoff. Site includes diagrams and patternbooks for making puppets of all kinds; scripts of puppet plays; thoughts on organizing parades and pageants; links to free puppet-lending libraries and other puppetry Web sites. Organization offers videos, DVDs, workshops, services, consulting.

The Unusual Suspects
Brings together entertainment-industry artists (directors, actors, writers, costume and set designers) to teach their craft to kids in the juvenile justice system and foster care, who then mount their own plays. Based in Los Angeles, Calif.; founded by Laura Leigh Hughes.

The Windmill Projects
Complete text of Robert E Gard's "Arts in a Small Community � A National Plan" (a.k.a. "The Windmill Book") from the late 60s, including new supplements and follow-up studies of Windmill projects in rural Wisconsin.

The Yes Men
Performers who have impersonated "some of the world's most powerful criminals at conferences, on the Web and on television, in order to correct their identities."

Theatre & Development (KIT)
About the use of theatrer to disseminate and communicate information, including street, puppet, participatory, popular, community, legislative and educational theater, theater in health education and edutainment. Special project of Netherlands-based KIT (Royal Tropical Institute).

Theatre Communications Group
National theater organization with services "to strengthen, nurture and support the not-for-profit American theatre." Home of American Theatre magazine.

Theatre Embassy
International theater organization with youth projects in Nicaragua, Namibia, Georgia, Egypt, Bolivia and more. "Theatrical expression is the opposite of oppression and the ultimate way of uniting people."

Theatre Topics
Theater journal edited by Harley Erdman at Johns Hopkins University.

Theatre and Development in Canada
Searchable database/registry of Canadian projects, practitioners, researchers, teachers, and resources in field of theater and development. Includes popular and political theater; theatre for personal, social, and community development; participatory, celebratory, and intercultural theater and large-scale Collaborative Community Play. Anyone may register. By Edward Little and Michael Longford, Concordia University.

TheatreWorks Consulting
Company based in Victoria, B.C., Canada, that offers workshops using games and exercises of Theatre for Living to work for healthy change in schools, communities, organizations and workplaces.

Time & Space Limited
Hudson Valley, N.Y. arts organization with programs in all disciplines dedicated to community and activism. Youth projects and Time To Talk discussion series on local political, social and environmental topics that reflect regional and national concerns. Founded 1991 by N.Y. theater artists Linda Mussmann and Claudia Bruce.

Touchable Stories
Series of interactive installation/performance pieces designed to dynamically frame issue and concerns of urban neighborhoods.

Touchstone Theatre
Ensemble movement theater based in Bethlehem, Pa. Fosters intercultural, international and community collaborations and presents original work by other innovative theatre ensembles and solo artists. Numerous community partners. Public programs: ArtsTouch, Arts in Education Opportunities, Professional Training Apprenticeships, CampTouchstone summer theater camp for kids.

Tramtactic
Australian "organic non-organisation of people who come together with artist Mick Douglas to undertake art projects in the public domain departing from the potential of tramways." Temporary public art events, many aboard trams in both Australia and India; publication.

Traveling Jewish Theatre
San Francisco artist-led ensemble with a body of work in the tradition of Jewish culture.

Tribes Project
Teen theater based in Seattle, Wash., high schools creating acclaimed diversity projects.

Tricinium Ltd
Community performance group in New Hampshire, directed by composer Lawrence Siegel. Special focus on the environment.

True Story Theater
Playback Theatre ensemble made up of actors, counselors and educators, executive directors, activists, health care professionals, singers, artists and business consultants dedicated to "social healing" for groups. Performances, playshops, training. Based in arlington, Mass.

Two Girls Working
Renee Piechocki and Tiffavy Ludwig investigating feminism through community arts dialogue.

Umoja Institute of African American Culture,Trade and
Based in New Orleans, La., founded 1981 to improve conditions in the city. Primary commitment to creation of Carver Cultural Center, "a permanent 'living' repository and exhibit of the cultural, musical and arti]stic talents and treasures indigenous to the African-American community of New Orleans and its unique, historic Fauborg (neighborhood), Treme."

Unconditional Theatre
Documentary theater company that explores contemporary issues and events with the actual words, stories, and participation of those involved. Documentary performances in community settings, Story Swaps (participatory storytelling events), Political Dialogues (readings of newspapers & ballot books) and Unconditional Testimonials (interview-based performances honoring individuals). Based in Berkeley, Calif.

Under Pressure
International newsletter from Holland offering news from the "Theatre of the Oppressed community" utilizing methods of Augusto Boal.

Undesirable Elements
Interactive Web site dedicated to Ping Chong’s "Undesirable Elements/Secret History" series, an ongoing community-specific oral-history theater project exploring issues of race, culture and identity in the lives of individuals living between cultures. Since 1992, Ping Chong has created over 30 works in this series in U.S. and abroad. Site contains background information, production history, photos, script and video samples, frequently asked questions, related links, resources for further research, interactive features.

Visible Theatre
New York-based company "promoting social justice and bringing voice and visibility to disempowered populations." True Story Project teaches acting and original performance to adults with disabilities.

Walk the Plank
Nonprofit organization located in Salford, England, that creates elaborate outdoor theater and fireworks shows. Also works in partnership with local authorities and agencies to create participatory projects for children, young people and adults. Operates a theater ship.

Why the Arts Matter in Education: or Just What Do Children Learn When They Create an Opera?
Study of school-based elementary opera program. Found that students in the opera setting participate more substantively in group interactions than students in alternative settings. This collaborative work leads to more effective problem solving. Uses both qualitative and quantitative data. By Dennie Palmer Wolf (In Champions of Change, the Arts Education Partnership and the President's Committee on the Arts and Humanities, 1999).

Young Native Voices: Theater Education Project
Workshops and residencies for Native American youths at the Southern California Indian Center (Fountain Valley) and the American Indian Clubhouse (Los Angeles). Nationwide outreach residency program to U.S. reservations by Native Voices theater artists and mentors. Formerly known as Native Voices Young Playwrights Project. Project of Native Voices at the Autry program at the Autry National Center in Los Angeles, Calif.

Youth Ensemble of Atlanta
Georgia-based African-American youth theater company. Original issue-based musical dramas, professional training, internships, record company, international exchange, scholarships, Youth Empowerment Summer. Founded 1990 by Freddie Hendricks.

viBe Theater Experience
Performing-arts education organization in New York City for girls. Theater, writing and music programs. Apprenticeships, leadership training, mentoring, school partnerships.