Performative embodied identities: using acting and storytelling to explore identity and careers

During October 2021, Staffordshire University Department of Media, Performance and Communication hosted an intensive week for the DICO project. Looking at oral storytelling, narratology, acting and embodiment, participants explored how to use these techniques and methodologies in two ways. Firstly, as process, whereby these become enablers to reflect and explore past and present career stories, by creating a narrative around this, as well as imagining a future self. Secondly, as vehicles for product in their own right: to create a career story as an output using these forms. This chapter steps us through some of the key practices of that week and introduces the critical framework.