Censorship as care: Towards a twenty-first-century engaged performance pedagogy

This collaborative writing explores engaged performance pedagogy in a non-traditional classroom setting. Through performative dialogue, co-authors – including instructors and students – reflect on the complexities of teaching and learning performance studies in an environment shaped by surveillance, power dynamics and systemic inequities. We extend Dwight Conquergood’s concept of co-performative witnessing to theorize censorship as care in this non-traditional learning space and to examine the tensions between amplifying voices and protecting vulnerable individuals. The co-authors navigate ethical responsibilities, adapting their pedagogical approaches to foster trust, creative expression and critical engagement. Students’ personal narratives illustrate performance as a tool for self-discovery, resistance and communal transformation. By centring lived experience and collaborative storytelling, the article expands understandings of performance and performance pedagogy beyond traditional academic spaces. Ultimately, we argue for an engaged, responsive pedagogy that acknowledges both the risks and the radical possibilities of performance in constrained environments.