College of Liberal Arts

This study examines the uneven development in the BLISTT area by describing the business activities there. It focuses on the business establishments found in the municipalities of Itogon, Sablan, Tuba and Tublay (ISTT) for the year 2015 aiming to describe the business activities there following the 2009 Philippine Standard Industrial Classification (PSIC). The business establishments in each municipality were classified in a selection of 21 sections (1-digit alphabetical codes), 88 divisions (2-digit codes) and 245 groups (3-digit codes) of the PSIC. The market concentration of the different industries in the ISTT area were also measured using the Herfindahl-Hirschman Index (HHI) and the Four-Firm Concentration Ratio (CH4).

The results of the study show that majority of business establishments in ISTT falls under Section G or wholesale and retail trade; repair of motor vehicles and motorcycles, Section I or accommodation and food service activities, and Section F or construction. The HHI values show that most (7 out of 19) industries in ISTT are not concentrated. Using CH4, however, it was found that 11 out of 19 industries in ISTT are highly concentrated and that the market is dominated by the top 4 business firms. Lastly, the uneven development within BLISTT area can be associated to the agglomerated and attractive business environment that Baguio City presents. Together with its historical dominance and outstanding road networks, business firms tend to locate in Baguio City, hoping to take advantage of the benefits that agglomeration presents and create profitable opportunities from it, hence furthering the uneven development in the area.

Collaborative work has its own advantages and benefits. It introduces a more progressive and experiential way of learning, and most importantly, can help students enhance their skills in communication, teamwork, and leadership among others (Lima, Flores, Carvalho, & Janssen, 2007; Hall & Buzwell, 2012). Research on social loafing behavior, on the other hand, have shown the negative consequences and problems associated with working in groups. Social loafing or also referred to as free-riding is defined as the tendency of individuals to perform and contribute less in group tasks as compared when working alone (Ying, Li, Jiang,  Peng & Lin, 2014). This phenomenon has been demonstrated on previous experiments which tasks include rope pulling, shouting and clapping, item production, and so forth (Myers, 2012).

Having obsessions is part of the human experience (Whittal, Woody, McLean, Rachman, & Robichaud, 2010; Purdon & Clark, 1993). Some common obsessions include symmetry (arranging things in an orderly manner), cleanliness (frequent cleaning of own room or hand-washing after engaging in an outdoor activity), and something as simple as being fond of a certain object or person (e.g., a movie character, coffee, flowers). But unlike the normal intrusive thoughts that people experience on a daily basis, obsessions found in individuals suffering from obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) are characterized as persistent, more intense, and more discomforting and anxiety-provoking (American Psychiatric Association, 2013). In order to address these unwanted obsessive thoughts, people with OCD often perform compulsions (repetitive behaviors or rituals) to prevent or reduce the anxiety and distress brought by their obsessive thoughts (e.g., checking the stove for twenty times before going to sleep) (Morrison, 2014).

The consumption of news has transitioned from print media to social media as the age of online technology continues to elevate. Along with this advancement comes the sudden proliferation of fake news and unethical journalism that stems from a lack of information screening. This in turn affects the truth perception of Facebook news article readers. Research suggest that readers scrutinize presented arguments, making it more difficult for them to discern truth from rumor as lies often run rampant in Facebook news pages. As a result, this increases the likelihood of ethics disruption as the phenomenon has been shown to confuse aspiring journalists from distinguishing the authenticity found in news articles.
In this descriptive-qualitative study, the objective is to uncover the experiences of UST SHS Grade 12 aspiring journalism HUMSS students upon reading unethical news articles on the Presidential Communications’ Facebook page. Using the Elaboration Likelihood Theory, this will aid in illustrating how people express doubt through the central and peripheral paths. In applying this theory, UST Grade 12 HUMSS students may have the option of motivation in scrutinizing the article as suggested by the central path or they will analyze content based on peripheral indications as suggested by the peripheral path.
Through phenomenology, isolation of the shared lived human experience of UST Grade 12 HUMSS students will be extracted upon examining their ability to construct opinions based on the amount of unethical online news articles they consume weekly within a 4-hour period. To obtain the essence behind the phenomenon, ten (10) respondents will be initially selected through purposive means for a one-to-one in-depth interview.
Findings have produced a notable concept called the Investigative-Cognizance model. This suggests that UST Grade 12 HUMSS students evoked three types of doubt: doubt as exploitation, doubt as deformation, and doubt through popularity. This in turn elicited three various emotional responses. By exploitation and deformation, anger is manifested. By exploitation and popularity, hopelessness is displayed. Finally, by deformation and popularity, amusement is revealed. Once these responses are integrated, they will enter a process of cognition. However, when there is no response, the news reader will enter a process of negligence.
The study will benefit the academic community by allowing them to manufacture more efficient systems in screening information online; news websites by providing updated information on ethics which will help train current and future journalists; media practitioners by allowing them to reflect on their principles and help them understand what to do and not to do as practitioners of their respective field; and future researchers in curating programs and similar studies in the field that will solve the issues discovered upon execution of the study.

In this essay I reflect on my experiences as a theatre-maker and contracted Cultural Orientation Officer, working for an international, inter-governmental organisation during 2007-8. In this role I worked with refugee communities from Burma/Myanmar.    These were mainly ethnic Karen and Karenni people, offered resettlement to third countries from West Thailand, most predominantly to the USA.

Within this context, theatre-making became a device for information giving, and a means to inform refugees’ decisions on whether to resettle abroad. It also embodied calls from refugee leaders to maintain cultural identity during a time of significant change for everyone in the refugee camps. Particular strengths, skills, and memories associated with Karen identity, were articulated on stage as potentially stabilising entities within pre-departure and post-arrival refugee experiences.

As an arts and development worker, attempting to marry and maintain the basic premises of community development and community cultural development (CCD) within the dynamics of resettlement was complicated and challenging; especially when positioned alongside the often conflicting objectives and requirements of government departments and international organisations engaged in managing the resettlement programme and its procedures. Here, I relay some of these complexities, and discuss the power structures that acted to derail the centrality and agency of refugees’ experiences. I also discuss how power structures were reflected and challenged by the inclusion of theatre-making within the resettlement scenario. I go on to question what this means in relation to the designated and “crucial” role of the artist that Adams and Goldbard have stated as being at the crux of the basic principles of CCD (Low 2012).

In Burma/Myanmar and Thailand, theatre-makers engaged in social and political change work in diverse contexts and within diverse communities. They develop participatory performance projects which attempt to address and navigate ongoing societal shifts. Through programmes of intercultural exchange, these theatre-makers share experiences, performance skills and traditions, pedagogies, and ideological positions. As a result social and aesthetic processes coalesce and coagulate within existing networks of people and practices. Studying such programmes of exchange can potentially reveal a regional ethos of theatre-making engaged in social change.

During intercultural processes and events, misunderstandings and misrecognitions between participants can arise. Culturally specific perspectives and affective practices come into contact with one another, and at times collide. Such dynamics can create feelings of awkwardness and confusion, which in turn produce subtle silences that shape the theatre-making social environ. Yet, how to account for such silences with specificity?

To begin answering this question, I consider the comparative cultural concepts of anadeh - Burma/Myanmar, and kreng jai - Thailand, and their embodied presences in intercultural programmes of theatre exchange. Both concepts have been described as consideration or deference towards the feelings of others, particularly in relation to felt intimacy, and social hierarchy. Almost forty years ago, anthropologist Bekker characterised anadeh as an entity that could destabilise social and political interactions, with such deference to others feelings also creating potential for manipulation (Bekker 1981). Contemporaneously, psychological anthropologist Casanitti suggests that kreng jai represents respect for others, not only performances of social obligation (Casanitti 2015). Anadeh and kreng jai hold significant agency in the social interactions of everyday life in Burma/Myanmar and Thailand. I suggest programmes of intercultural theatre exchange provide a research context, and venue to effectively model and compare anadeh and kreng jai, and the subtle silences they can contribute towards producing.

In Yangon, Burma/Myanmar, social change can be heard within the composition of the city’s developing ‘soundscape’. Due to recent political and social reforms, the city is becoming noisier. What does this noise explain about the direction in which change is heading? How does the current “aural architecture” affect the attentive listener’s auditory experience? Listening, as an engaged act of ‘paying attention’ to the environment is knowledge bearing and informs how local theatre makers attune themselves to social change. For the practitioner-researcher, leaning in to listen to the lives of these theatre-makers provides sensory data from which to develop new critical perspectives.

Since 2006 large scale refugee resettlement to the USA has occurred along the Thai-Burma border. The largely Karen and Karenni refugee communities have been presented with the option of remaining in the camps, or resettling to the USA and other countries. For the first time, a US refugee resettlement information campaign was established, incorporating theatre as a medium to facilitate this decision making process.

As a theatre-maker working for an international organisation in the refugee camps, I was involved in working with refugee actors to devise a series of plays in order to communicate a fictional experience of a Karen refugee family resettlement to the USA. Central to the themes of the plays were coping strategies to manage anxiety, and the potential benefits of maintaining a sense of collective cultural and ethnic identity during a time of considerable change and mass mobility. The notion of what we will carry in our “hands, heads, and hearts”, was introduced as a way to gather, situate and organise memories in addressing feelings of disorientation, dislocation, and pending cultural adaptation. These “hands, heads, and hearts” form a set of tools that acts as a “memory track” where the body becomes a site to mediate and assimilate feelings and experiences related to particular memories.

This paper examines how theatre can suggest the body is able to provide a sense of continuity that draws together the experiences of flight from Burma, stasis in Thai refugee camps, and resettlement to a third country.

While theatre can perform memory, it can also act as a device to demonstrate the body as a technological resource - within the context of refugee resettlement experience - to explore and navigate memories of the past, present, and uncertain futures. Some of the questions that I address in this paper include: To what degree are the staging of these memories representing an ideal?  Is this ideal formed solely to serve refugees, or is it also influenced by the underlying agenda of other stakeholders in the resettlement process who would like to expedite refugees’ decision to leave the refugee camp?  Can organising embodied memories provide a stabilising effect within the resettlement experience?

Certain repeated moral narratives support justifications for humanitarian interventions, and simultaneously inform perspectives of ‘the figure of the refugee’. How does ‘the humanitarian’ appear in these narratives? How are the characters of ‘the refugee’ and ‘the humanitarian’ constructed in relation to one another? How does their interlinkage potentially affect refugees’ agency to act, within a neo-liberal and universalist trope of geo-political expansion? In this article I respond to these questions and describe a theatricality of humanitarian action. I do so by drawing on experiences as a theatre-maker working in a refugee resettlement programme in Thailand, in 2007-2008.

This paper focusses on a theatre project that was made in August to October 2017. A play was created by Thukhuma Khayeethe (Arts Traveller) Theatre Group from Yangon, with the Chin Human Rights Organisation (CHRO) based in Hakha. With a focus on safer migration practices, and the broader narratives of what migration does for and to Chin State, this paper walks the reader through the complex processes and cultural politics of making CHRO’s thialkamnak darama (migration drama), entitled Dam Thein Kan Khua? (Farewell Our Village?).
Overall the paper questions the export of Thukhuma Khayeethe’s collaborative approaches to theatre-making into the Chin, largely Christian, community, and at this moment of socio-political transition. Attention is also placed on the affects and effects of investment in the country from the international development industry. The context of the project usefully acts to centralise Chin State’s geo-cultural and linguistic diversity, rather than marginalising it, and attends to the impacts therein on creative and critical decision-making in this theatrical scenario. The paper probes the basis under which thinking from within the Chin space, can activate cross-fertilisation of thought and practices, providing new perspectives for Buddhist theatre-makers who are committed to equitable socially engaged processes, which ultimately aim to support public engagement with the broader issues related to migration, international development, and social change in Burma/Myanmar.
This paper is co-authored by Thila Min, Thukhuma Khayeethe’s Artistic Director, and Dr Matthew Yoxall, a Thailand based theatre-maker and training consultant. They reflect on their experiences of leading the above project, provide a reflexive account of that experience, and in relation to their co-development of a notion of a theatre of the middle way, which aims to bring an appropriate Buddhist perspective to acts of collaborative theatre-making, enabling positive interactions across ethnic and religious lines in Burma/Myanmar.

As Burma/Myanmar struggles to transition from six decades of civil war and attempts to perform as a legitimate democracy on the world’s stage socially engaged theatre-makers must work in relation to contiguous systems of democratisation and stratocracy. Making theatre within diverse contexts and with diverse communities, at times these theatre-makers collaborate with one another, engaging in processes of creative exchange. Thus, certain similarities in their approaches exist. A particular ethos, or moral character and associated set of convictions, permeates their work. Writing from within a theatrical process in Chin State, Burma/Myanmar,  I premise this emergent ethos is a 'Theatre of the Middle Way.'