Getting the message : measuring audience response to theatre for development

The approach explored in this study involved the application of rhetorical criticism to a given performance text as a means of establishing its persuasive purpose in general, and to identify those specific artistic strategies employed to achieve that purpose. Insofar as these strategies take the form of rhetorical appeals designed to generate a particular response in the audience, it seemed possible to devise an audience-sensitive instrument to determine whether or not they had the desired effect. The study only attempts to measure the communicational efficacy of the art without reference to broader questions of knowledge transmission or attitude change.