Published: Wednesday, 3rd February, 2010 5:00pm

Is anyone interested in The Life Of An Asylum Seeker?

A Galway community theatre company, ALâ, is putting out a call to venue managers or community organisations in Cavan who would be interested in staging a play with a multicultural theme.

A Day In The Life Of An Asylum Seeker is described as "an interactive performance for all those interested in theatre as a force for change". ALâ are hoping to start a national tour from April this year and project director, Jim Aherne, says there is also a possibility of a daylong workshop to run hand-in-hand with the performance.

A Day In The Life Of An Asylum Seeker explores perceptions and attitudes toward asylum seekers, encourages participation and integration, in order to generate greater community awareness.

The play is developed from a story by Adedotun Adekeye and facilitated by Annette Tierney of Jikijela, the theatre-based learning company. The project was funded by the Department of Integration.

Film-making tutor at Galway Mayo Institute of Technology, Vivienne Dick, said the play left her with plenty to think about.

"We very rarely have the opportunity to hear the voices of asylum seekers and there are so few occasions we have a chance to meet or socialize with them. This play, devised by the performers was a true collaboration - or came across as such anyway - with the experiences and perspectives of people who live as asylum seekers in hostels and hotels revealing their day to day struggles to live and remain positive while under the threat of being sent back to an often unsafe country alone or with their partners and families," according to the Irish experimental and documentary filmmaker.

Practical issues that emerge in the play include life in crowded accommodation, shortage of money for day to day needs, institutional living with little accommodation for individual culture and diets, lack of privacy, and casual racism on the street.

The techniques used by the project are derived from 'theatre of the oppressed'. These methods, including forum theatre, were created by Augusto Boal in Brazil in the 1970s. Originally designed as a method of 'flushing out' social conflicts they have been adapted to suit many other contexts where people seek to alter, resolve or improve behaviour or human relations.

The method centres on people performing versions of their own lives and then becoming involved in their reconstruction.

Whereas, generally theatre is used to entertain or portray a moral, through a performance, to its audience, Boal's methods and dramatic practices introduced a new form of theatre, one which not only involves the spectators but sends a strong, impacting message to the viewer. Speaking about theatre of the oppressed, Adrian Jackson, who translated Augusto Boal's work, captured the essence of the process: "about acting rather than talking, questioning rather than giving answers, analysing rather than accepting"

• For information about A Day In The Life Of An Asylum Seeker, contact Jim Aherne, ALâ project director, at alagalway@gmail.com or 086-8461270.