A dramatization is the creation of a dramatic
performance
A performance is an act of staging or presenting a play, concert, or other form of entertainment. It is also defined as the action or process of carrying out or accomplishing an action, task, or function.
Management science
In the work place ...
of material depicting real or
fiction
Fiction is any creative work, chiefly any narrative work, portraying individuals, events, or places that are imaginary, or in ways that are imaginary. Fictional portrayals are thus inconsistent with history, fact, or plausibility. In a traditi ...
al events. Dramatization may occur in any media, and can play a role in education and the psychological development of children. The production of a dramatization presents potential legal issues, arising both from the use of elements of fictional works created by others, and with the depiction of real persons and events.
Usage
Dramatization may occur in many circumstances, and be presented in many forms of media:
In television, a dramatization is "the preparation of a television drama from a work which was not previously in dramatic form, for example a prose narrative". The form is often used in
television commercials depicting the benefits of using an advertised product, "because dramatization is a form particularly well suited to television". Although dramatization and
adaptation
In biology, adaptation has three related meanings. Firstly, it is the dynamic evolutionary process of natural selection that fits organisms to their environment, enhancing their evolutionary fitness. Secondly, it is a state reached by the po ...
are sometimes used interchangeably, the
BBC distinguishes a dramatization from an adaptation by the criteria that an adaptation is a preparation derived from a dramatic work. When the events being dramatized are historical, this may also be considered a form of
historical reenactment, and occurs within the genre of
docudrama
Docudrama (or documentary drama) is a genre of television and film, which features dramatized re-enactments of actual events. It is described as a hybrid of documentary and drama and "a fact-based representation of real event".
Docudramas typic ...
. In some cases, in conveying the lives of historical figures "dramatization is a necessity due to lack of documentation".
[Rebecca Monhardt, "Reading and Writing Nonfiction With Children", in Jodi Wheeler-Toppen, ''Science the "Write" Way'' (2011), p. 219.]
Dramatization has been described as "a primitive instinct and very early people expressed their thoughts and emotions through this medium, or at least through that of pantomime, which is so closely connected with it".
[Grace Evelyn Starks, "Dramatization", ''Primary Education'', Volume 22 (1914), p. 529.] In particular, "
en children identify with the various characters in the story, it is natural for them to want to imitate those characters".
[Nancy E. Briggs, Joseph Anthony Wagner, ''Children's Literature Through Storytelling & Drama'' (1979), p. 81.] To a degree, any attempt to describe an event other than in a clinical sense requires some dramatization:
Children, through play, unconsciously begin to act out the dramatization of events in their lives and events of which they learn.
Research has shown that "with a variety of students from different grades and socioeconomic backgrounds, through expression of feelings and thoughts in story dramatization and creative drama, self concept is improved".
Legal issues
Legally, the creation of a dramatization may infringe on the
intellectual property rights of the work from which it is derived. A dramatization of real events might infringe the
personalty rights of the individuals involved. However, it is also understood that the dramatization itself maybe entitled to its own intellectual property protections:
References
External links
{{wiktionary
Drama