Festivals And Edutainment

"As the first collection of studies to explore the use of edutainment within festival experiences, this book extends current knowledge and understanding of festival experiences. Relying on a series of international case studies, this book offers readers unique and important insights that emphasise the benefit of edutainment activities for enhanced audience learning, engagement, and festival satisfaction. This book is valuable for scholars, festival organisers, policy makers and students interested in or studying festivals, events, edutainment and/or experience design. Other tourism industry scholars, professionals and students of, for example, visitor attractions, museums, theatre and hospitality services, may also find this book of value considering their established use of edutainment within their sectors"--

As the first collection of studies to explore the use of edutainment within festival experiences, this book extends current knowledge and understanding of festival experiences. Relying on a series of international case studies, this book offers readers unique and important insights that emphasise the benefit of edutainment activities for enhanced audience learning, engagement, and festival satisfaction. Although there is an ample amount of studies concerning festival experiences, as well as the use of edutainment within tourism, few have explored the use of edutainment within festival experiences. This oversight has created a lack in knowledge and understanding, despite the clear benefits of enjoyable learning experiences - edutainment. Moreover, it has created a gap between academia and practice, as the contributing authors have demonstrated, festivals are utilising edutainment to enhance their audience experience, yet scholars have failed to acknowledge this. In response to this oversight, the editors have assembled a carefully curated collection of chapters that include a wide range of international case studies, from science and food festivals to heritage and dark festivals. Through a variety of methodologies and methods, including interviews, observations, databases, netnography, and social media analysis in both face-to-face and digital interactions involving the festival participants, organisers, and other relevant stakeholders, the contributing authors have provided a well-rounded global perspective on how edutainment is applied within festival experiences. This book is valuable for scholars, festival organisers, policy makers and students interested in or studying festivals, events, edutainment and/or experience design. Other tourism industry scholars, professionals and students of, for example, visitor attractions, museums, theatre and hospitality services, may also find this book of value considering their established use of edutainment within their sectors.

This book celebrates and builds on Alan Clarke (1956–2021) and Allan Jepson’s 2015 book Exploring Community Festivals and Events. It showcases how far the study of community festivals and events has come in the intervening years, and in so doing it is a response to recent calls for researchers to take a more critical approach to event studies. This is an interdisciplinary book that draws together empirical research across a wide range of community event types, sizes and within diverse communities. Chapters in this book are grouped into four themes that highlight the breadth and depth of work being done: reviving and maintaining tradition(s); a focus on belonging; challenges and tensions; and innovations in teaching and research. Another of its core strengths is its international perspective – the book encompasses research from around the world including Turkey, Portugal, Greece, India, the UK, the US, Austria and New Zealand. There is also a diverse range of theoretical lenses applied to the study of community events, and some innovative methodologies used to achieve research aims and objectives. This volume will appeal to students and researchers in the fields of critical event studies, cultural studies, place-making, tourism, music, sociology and geography. Several chapters also provide insights and key learnings for those lecturing and working in event management and industry professionals.

Religious events and cultural celebrations form an important part of societies throughout the world. They are key to social development and understanding, for celebrating diversity, as well as finding common ground. Covering a wide range of festivals from around the world, this book shows practitioners and teachers how they can introduce young children to some of the ideas behind these events and encourage them to have fun, get creative and work together. Aimed at those working with children aged 3 – 7, Using Festivals to Inspire and Engage Young Children covers a range of cultural celebration by each calendar month, explaining the background to these events and provides fun and imaginative activities and stories based around each one. Features include: a basic outline of each festival; a wide range of activities to suit children at different stages in their development; development and learning aims at the end of each chapter; suggestions for working with parents and links with home; top tips for creating your own activities relating to celebrations; story models that can be adapted and used to suit different events. Highly practical with an emphasis on fun and hands on learning, this book is a fantastic resource for Early Years practitioners, Primary School teachers and those that want to inspire young children and celebrate the world we live in.

Documentary film festivals do more than provide a venue for watching films: they have the potential to foster critical thinking, especially toward mainstream media. The film festivals discussed in this book also help build a sense of community locally, as well as promote solidarity with people involved in struggles for social justice and ecological integrity around the world. Documentaries by independent filmmakers reveal stories ignored by mass media, stories at times tragic but more often than not inspiring. It can be said that documentary film festivals create a public space for citizens to listen together and to become informed on current issues in greater depth than newscast bulletins offer. This book shows how documentary films create a liminal space with transformative potential, a space that challenges assumptions, supports the development of empathy, and often stimulates engagement and action. In viewing documentaries together and engaging in critical reflection and dialogue, citizens can imagine alternative possibilities and consider solutions. Documentary Film Festivals: Transformative Learning, Community Building & Solidarity offers the voices of attendees, sponsors, and organizers who shared their thoughts and experiences of documentary film festivals and the impact on their views and engagement. Activists and organizers of various social movements who are seeking ways to inform and inspire will see evidence in this text that documentary film festivals are a means of drawing diverse audiences, engaging differences and respectfully promoting hope and preferred visions of the future. Documentary Film Festivals: Transformative Learning, Community Building & Solidarity includes concrete examples of creative and courageous struggles that have led to victories often ignored by the media. This book is bound to inspire.

The Shakespearean World takes a global view of Shakespeare and his works, especially their afterlives. Constantly changing, the Shakespeare central to this volume has acquired an array of meanings over the past four centuries. "Shakespeare" signifies the historical person, as well as the plays and verse attributed to him. It also signifies the attitudes towards both author and works determined by their receptions. Throughout the book, specialists aim to situate Shakespeare’s world and what the world is because of him. In adopting a global perspective, the volume arranges thirty-six chapters in five parts: Shakespeare on stage internationally since the late seventeenth century; Shakespeare on film throughout the world; Shakespeare in the arts beyond drama and performance; Shakespeare in everyday life; Shakespeare and critical practice. Through its coverage, The Shakespearean World offers a comprehensive transhistorical and international view of the ways this Shakespeare has not only influenced but has also been influenced by diverse cultures during 400 years of performance, adaptation, criticism, and citation. While each chapter is a freshly conceived introduction to a significant topic, all of the chapters move beyond the level of survey, suggesting new directions in Shakespeare studies – such as ecology, tourism, and new media – and making substantial contributions to the field. This volume is an essential resource for all those studying Shakespeare, from beginners to advanced specialists.