"Do You Feel That?" Tracing the Affective Relationscapes of Youth Learning to Play a Part Together

Speaker: Jon Wargo, Associate Professor, Educational Studies, Marsal Family School of Education

Thursday, February 5, 2026

12:00 - 1:00 p.m.

Tribute Room - 1322

Marsal Family School of Education Building

610 E. University Ave, Ann Arbor, MI 48109

Professor Jon Wargo shares insights from his project with Shakespeare in Detroit’s Summer Youth Conservatory—a program providing hands-on learning experiences culminating in a youth-led production of a classic Shakespeare play. 

In his presentation, Professor Wargo explores how youth participants in a dramatic arts conservatory cultivated new relationscapes through the embodied processes of ‘feeling-with’ as they learned to play a part. Drawing on theoretical insights from affect studies and interaction analysis, Wargo re-enters video data generated from two ‘felt’ event sequences during rehearsal: animal work and stage combat. Through this dual lens and approach, he investigates how Manning's (2012) concept of “thinking-in-motion” functioned both as an artistic technique and a sentient mode of relational understanding. In doing so, Wargo seeks to extend conversations surrounding the performing arts’ place in the learning sciences while advancing the affective tapestry through which we might embroider and understand ensemble learning.

This project and event is supported by the Eileen Lappin Weiser Center for the Learning Sciences.

Bring your lunch and your curiosity! Light snacks will be provided.