A side-conversation with a psychologist, a designer and a couple of other folk, which hit my professional life so directly, I wonder how much of my airfare I can get on to work’s training budget… Maybe if I finish these scribblings into something coherent.
Be there: ask the questions. “How are you feeling?”
To use larp as a designer – simply by playing a role; designer vs. intern, yes. But also to use roleplay to understand experiences.
To play a role to understand those who truly have that role. You need to brief and research.
Thick characters Vs thin characters – you might miss something from a thick character, you might feel overwhelmed by one. Contrariwise, thin characters can play out as inaccurate stereotypes cf “refugees don’t have cell phones”
So empathic research needs to be based on the *right* amount of background – as we’d use the word in larp.
Roleplaying to give *some* voice to the underrepresented.
Roleplaying to give an alibi to critical opinion. “It’s not only my opinion”
Roleplaying to explore the experience of others.
The shared element here seems to be the discussion of the narrative afterwards – the meta-level. Groups who aren’t familiar with roleplay might use the artificiality of roleplaying to criticise the practice.
No, but… The need to fill the space with some opinion.
(In Norway, there’s a non-religious confirmation… It’s unrealistic. Exploring the symbolism, the “tiny version” of the experience.)
Facing the critique: frame it differently. Call
it a workshop.
Am empathetic experience. (Cf: a restaurant symbolising a hospital and drawing parallels between…
Ok, hitting publish because I can’t work out how to save a draft on my phone.
LARP experience 
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