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Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'African theatre'
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Luther, Carola. "South African theatre." Thesis, University of Leeds, 1987. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.375957.
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Munro, Allan John. "Athol Fugard's My Children! My Africa! in the South African theatre paradigm." The Ohio State University, 1993. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1298485307.
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Chinyowa, Kennedy C. "Manifestations of Play as Aesthetic in African Theatre for Development." Thesis, Griffith University, 2005. http://hdl.handle.net/10072/365480.
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The shift away from an exogenous or 'top-down' approach towards an endogenous or 'bottom-up' approach to theatre for development practice in contemporary development discourse has necessitated a search for a people-centred aesthetic paradigm. The 'endogenisation' of theatre for development recognises that processes of empowerment and transformation are internal to the mechanisms of social structures and cannot be entirely dependent on external social intervention. This study explored manifestations of play as a people-based aesthetic discourse in African theatre for development. The study was based on a view of play as a cultural phenomenon that was being applied for development communication in African popular theatre. The ethnography of performance was adopted as a suitable methodological framework for investigating play as an artistic medium with close links to the people's lived experience. The study made use of illustrations selected from theatre for development workshops carried out in Zimbabwe with comparisons drawn from other developing countries in Africa and beyond. Following the views of play theorists like Johan Huizinga (1955), Hans-Georg Gadamer (1975), Gregory Bateson (1976), Victor Turner (1983), Don Handelman (1990) and Brian Sutton-Smith (2002), the study examined how theatre for development practice can be framed by play as a popular discursive strategy. Play allows the co-players or participants to engage in spontaneous activity thereby allowing them room to articulate their own point of view. By selecting situations from real life, participants construct a fictional narrative giving form to imagination. The resulting performance creates a performer-audience encounter that is both real and not real. The mimetic action must be seen as 'revising' rather than 'copying' from the existing situation. It creates new frames of existence or 'restored behaviours' that act as rehearsals for action. The whole playing process is experienced as a metaxis of seemingly irreconciliable opposites - the real and the fictional. Yet it is precisely this metaxic encounter facilitated through play that creates possibilities for a real encounter with development. Such transformation may occur either simultaneously within play itself or subsequent to it. Thus the play frame affords the co-players an aesthetic space upon which they can experiment with ways and means of altering the prevailing challenges of existence. Theatre for development creates space for participants to assess their needs and fashion their priorities with a view to change their unfavourable circumstances. The fun or joy associated with play wields the power to absorb and move the players to another state of being. Once they have attained the sense of freedom created within the play frame, participants feel liberated from the fears, constraints and obligations of ordinary reality. The consequences of their actions are minimized as their actions are camouflaged within the paradox of play. In this study, I examined how play discourse enabled popular theatre practitioners and participants to address quite sensitive issues without threatening the social structure. The ordering and shaping of play through workshops became a way of making 'something' come into being. The workshop performances acted as discursive frames for creating alternative realities for the participants. In short, the study attempted to come up with a conceptualisation of play as an aesthetic whose frames were situated within the people's language of performance. It concludes that theatre for development practice could be made more effective by drawing its aesthetic paradigms from the people who are the subject and object of development. In this way, it becomes a people's theatre that never ceases to 'develop' but allows participants to 'dream' the impossible and perhaps make it come true.Thesis (PhD Doctorate)
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)
School of Vocational, Technology and Arts Education
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Van, Heerden Johann. "Theatre in a new democracy : some major trends in South African theatre from 1994 to 2003." Thesis, Link to the online version, 2008. http://hdl.handle.net/10019/917.
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Okagbue, Osy A. "Aspects of African and Caribbean theatre : a comparative study." Thesis, University of Leeds, 1990. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.249811.
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Banning, Yvonne. "English language usage in South African Theatre since 1976." Thesis, University of Cape Town, 1989. http://hdl.handle.net/11427/23508.
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Curenton, Myron Wade. "Plowshares Theatre Company the first twenty years." Diss., Connect to online resource - MSU authorized users, 2008.
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Thesis (M.A.)--Michigan State University. Dept. of Theatre, 2008."The objective of this study is to discuss the history and origin of the Plowshares Theatre Company based upon an interview with the current artistic director, Gary Anderson, and his assistant, Dr. Addell [Austin] Anderson"-- vFrom the abstract. Title from PDF t.p. (viewed on Aug. 4, 2009) Also issued in print.
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Asiedu, Awo Mana. "West African theatre audiences : a study of Ghanaian and Nigerian audiences of literary theatre in English." Thesis, University of Birmingham, 2003. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.288805.
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This thesis examines the question of who the main audiences of West African literary theatre in English are and what they expect from literary theatre performances. Through a survey of audiences at performances in Ghana and Nigeria, it shows that the main audiences of literary theatre in English in this region of Africa are mainly students and the educated elite. The language of these plays and the main venues of performance are largely seen as responsible for this limited but important audience. The study concludes that since playwrights and their audiences see theatre as a medium for social change and edification respectively, this category of audiences are strategic targets. The study, however, sees the role of other theatre practices, such as Theatre for Development and Concert Party Theatre, which are in local languages and target the larger, less educated sections of society as more relevant but complementary to literary theatre in English. This thesis also highlights the lively interaction of West African audiences with theatre performances. Theatre practitioners encourage the active participation of their audiences by casting them in concrete roles or by directly addressing them, thus insisting on their participation.
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Litkie, Celeste Avril. "Selected black African dramatists South of the Zambezi." Thesis, Stellenbosch : University of Stellenbosch, 2003. http://hdl.handle.net/10019.1/5692.
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244 leaves printed on single pages, preliminary pages and numbered pages 1-234. Includes bibliography, list of appendices. Digitized at 330 dpi black and white PDF format (OCR), using a KODAK i 1220 PLUS scanner.Thesis (DPhil (Drama))--University of Stellenbosch, 2003.
ENGLISH ABSTRACT: Late twentieth century theatre studies has been characterised by an expansion of the notion of theatre to encompass an enormous variety of performance-based activities. A range of pioneering academics and practitioners have moved beyond the old European-American paradigm of the literary theatre, to recognize the unique qualities of the performance as a theatrical artefact in its own right. One of the by-products of this paradigm shift has been what some would term the death - or at least diminution - of the dramatist or playwright. Another has been the (re-)discovery of what is vaguely referred to as "African theatre". This study had no intention of taking up the argument about the precise forms and processes that belong under that rubric, nor the many problems associated with such categorizing. It has a much more mundane aim, namely to look at one form of play creation - formal playwriting - in a specified region of the vast African continent, south of the Zambezi. The focus is very specifically on published or written texts, created and produced in South Africa, Namibia, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Lesotho, Swaziland and Mozambique. For a variety of reasons not all these countries could be studied, but enough material was found to arrive at some initial conclusions. In this respect, this is a pioneering study, since no such comparative survey has yet been done. Based on a previous pilot study by Dennis Schauffer at the University of Durban-Westville, the study utilises a process model of the theatrical system proposed by Temple Hauptfleisch (1997) as a frame of reference and a range of four basic kinds of data to answer a number of questions to study the writers and their works. The materials utilized are: 1. Play scripts 2. Biographical data, press cuttings, video recordings, articles. 3. Interviews and interviewer's journal entries. 4. Studies of the socio-political milieu. Data was gathered on 12 writers and their works, as well as some substantial information on community theatre and related forms in the region. The primary authors discussed in some detail are Gibson Kente, Zakes Mda, Gcina Mhlope, Matsemela Manaka, Fani-Kayode Osazuwa Omoregie, Freddy Philander, Vickson Tablah Hangula, Tsokolo Muso (Tjotela mor'a Moshpela), Sonny Sampson-akpan, Andreas Mavuso, and Sipho Mtetwa. With this data the study seeks to address a number of questions concerning playwriting in the sub-continent. These include: 1. a comparison of existing performance forms and their relationships to oral traditions; 2. the influence of socio-political contexts on the works produced; 3. the relationship between plays and the other media, such as film and television; 4. a consideration of audiences (or target audiences) and their impact on the form and content of works; 5. the impact of the nature of, access to and availability of venues; 6. the role played by funding and relationships to state institutions; 7. language choices and their impact on the arts; 8. And finally, the interesting question of cross-cultural encounters and their influence on the forms of theatre in the region. This set of questions provide the context for a study of the variety of theatrical and performance output generated in Africa, south of the Zambezi, and to identify some common and/or divergent cultural influences in the works of the selected black African dramatists in the southern sub-continent of Africa. As expected, one such common denominator was the oral tradition, the other was the colonial heritage of western, Eurocentric theatre and literary practices. The dynamic between these traditions proved to be a point of some interest, but also posed many methodological problems. Two other major factors in many of the countries have proven to be the lack of a strong theatrical infrastructure and divergent audience expectations, which have led to a proliferation of non-formal and applied theatre processes (e.g. in political theatre, popular theatre, community theatre, theatre for development, etc), which in their turn pose their own methodological problems for researchers. In the final analysis, given the restraints under which the candidate had to work, the study could only look at some interesting but selected authors, who in their works seem to illustrate some of the variety and energy of the widely dispersed region. Hopefully in doing this it provided a few broad indications of important trends. More importantly perhaps, the study did identify a number of areas for future research. It would seem that, besides a tremendous need to do considerably more work on the collection and archiving of data on theatre and performance systems, practitioners and practice in Southern Africa, there are at least three additional areas of research that require particular attention: 1. the development of an appropriate theatre research methodology for application in the region; 2. a study of the role played by foreign nationals; 3. the setting up of a national and continent-wide database on theatre in Africa.
AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: Teaternavorsing word in die laat twintigste eeu gekenmerk deur 'n uitbreiding van die konsep teater om 'n enorme spektrum tipes aanbiedings-aktiwiteite ("performance activities") te behels. Verskeie leidinggewende akademici en praktisyns het verby die ou Europees-Amerikaanse paradigma van literere teater beweeg om die die unieke kwaliteite van die aanbieding ("performance") as 'n kreatiewe artefak in eie reg. Een van die newe-produkte van hierdie verskuiwing in paradigma is die sogenaamde "dood" - of ten minste die afskaling van die rol van die toneelskrywer of dramaturg. 'n Ander (her)ontdekking was wat ons breedweg na verwys as Afrikateater. Die studie beoog nie om al die ou argumente oor die presiese vorms en prosesse wat onder daardie benaming behoort te behandel nie, of om nogeens te spekuleer oor die menige probleme wat met sodanige kategorisering gepaard gaan nie. Die doelwit is veel eenvoudiger: om na een vorm van teksskepping (formele toneelskryf) te kyk in 'n gespesifiseerde streek van die Afrika-kontinent, suid van die Zambesi. Die fokus is pertinent op gepubliseerde of geskrewe tekste, geskep en opgevoer in Suid-Afrika, Namibia, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Lesotho, Swaziland en Mozambique. Om verskeie redes is nie al die lande uiteindelik deurtastend bestudeer nie, maar genoeg materiaal kon ingewin word om tog by 'n aantal voorlopige gevolgtrekkings uit te kom. In hierdie opsig is die studie uniek, aangesien nog geen ander vergelykende studie van teater in hierdie lande onderneem is nie. Die ondersoek is gebaseer op 'n loodsprojek wat deur Dennis Schauffer by die Universiteit van Durban-Westville onderneem is, en maak gebruik van 'n prosesmodel van die teatersisteem wat deur Temple Hauptfleisch (1997) ontwikkel is om as 'n raamwerk te dien waarbinne vier stelle bronne ontleed en bespreek word. Die tersake bronne behels: 1. Toneeltekste 2. Biografiese inligting 3. Onderhoude, persberigte, video-opnames, artikels 4. Studies van die sosio-politieke milieu. Inligting is oor twaalf dramaturge en hulle werk ingewin, saam met substansiele inligting oor gemeenskapsteater en aanverwante vorme. Die hoof skrywers wat in besonderhede bespreek word is Gibson Kente, Zakes Mda, Gcina Mhlope, Matsemela Manaka, Fani-Kayode Osazuwa Omoregie, Freddy Philander, Vickson Tablah Hangula, Tsokolo Muso (Tjotela mar' a Moshpela), Sonny Sampson-akpan, Andreas Mavuso, en Sipho Mtetwa. Met hierdie data het die ondersoeker gepoog om 'n aantal vrae oor toneelskryf op die sub-kontinent aan te spreek. Die vrae sluit in: 1. 'n vergelyking tussen bestaande aanbiedingsvorms en hulle verwantskap met orale tradisies; 2. die invloed van sosio-politieke kontekste op die werke gelewer; 3. die verhouding tussen toneelstukke en ander media vorme, soos film en televisie; 4. 'n kyk na gehore (of teiken gehore) en hulle impak op die vorm en inhoud van werke; 5. die impak, aard en toeganklikheid van speelruimtes; 6. die rol gespeel deur befondsing en die verhouding met staats-instellings; 7. taalkeuses en hulle impak op die kunste; 8. en laastens: die interressante kwessie van kruis-kulurele kontakte en hulle invloed op die vorme van teater in die streek. Hierdie stel vrae vorm die konteks vir 'n ondersoek na die verskeidenheid van teater en aanbiedingsuitsette wat suid van die Zambesi gegenereer word, en die identifisering van sommige gemeenskaplike en uiteenlopende kulturele invloede in die werke van swart Afrika-skrywers in die gebied. Soos verwag, was een van die gemeenskaplikhede die orale tradisie, 'n ander die koloniale erfenis van Westerse, Eurosentriese teater en literere gebruike. Die dinamiese interaksie tussen hierdie twee tradisies het van besondere belang geblyk te wees, maar impliseer ook n hele aantal metodologiese probleme. Twee ander faktore wat in baie van die bestudeerde lande sleutel rolle speel is die tekort aan 'n sterk teaterinfrastruktuur en uiteenlopende gehoorverwagtinge - wat lei tot 'n proliferasie van nie-formele en toegepaste teaterprosesse (bv. in politieke teater, populêreteater, gemeenskapsteater, teater vir ontwikkeling, ens.), wat op hulle beurt ook spesifieke metodologiese uitdagings aan die navorser stel. Gegee die beperkinge waaronder die kandidaat moes werk, kon die studie dus slegs na 'n aantal interessante maar geselekteerde outeurs kyk, wie se werke die verskeidenheid en energie van teater in die wydverspreide streek illustreer. Hopelik het die studie op die wyse 'n aantal bree aanduidings kon gee van belangrike tendense. Terselfdertyd is 'n aantal belangrike terreine vir toekomstige navorsing geidentifiseer. Dit wil voorkom asof daar, benewens 'n enorme behoefte aan die byeenbring en argivering van data oor teater sisteme, praktisyns en aanbiedings in die streek, drie terreine is waarop dringned gewerk moet word: 1. Die ontwikkelling van 'n toepaslike teaternavorsingsmetodologie; 2. 'n studie van die rol gespeel deur buitelandse praktisyns in die ontwikkelling van inheemse vorme; 3. die daarstel van 'n omvangryke nasionale en trans-kontinentale databasis oor teater in Afrika.
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Devlin, Luke. "The trickle down effect : the 1911/1912 Abbey Theatre tour of America and its impact on early African American theatre." Thesis, University of Edinburgh, 2017. http://hdl.handle.net/1842/25684.
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This thesis will examine the direct and indirect impact the Irish National theatre had upon American theatre in general and the African American theatre in particular. It discusses the relationship between the Irish theatrical movement during the Irish Literary Renaissance and the drama that was produced during the Harlem Renaissance. To do this Rorty’s concepts of the ‘strong poet’ and ‘ironist’ will be utilized. The bleeding and cross contamination of culture, it is contended, was due to the American tour that the Irish Players undertook in 1911/12. The tour, although staged in white theatre houses and attended by a mainly white audience, had a sizeable impact on the American theatrical landscape. This thesis will chart the course of this change, from the tour through to the beginnings of the Harlem Renaissance. From the Abbey Theatre to the Little Theatre movement and from there to the African American theatre a continuous thread of de-reification, of cultural awakenings is established. In essence, the source of the African American theatre, both the Artistic stylings and hopes of Alain Locke and the propaganda aspirations of W.E.B. DuBois will be referred back to the Irish tour.
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Krasner, David. "Resistance, parody, and double consciousness in African American theatre, 1895-1910 /." Thesis, Connect to Dissertations & Theses @ Tufts University, 1996.
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Thesis (Ph.D.)--Tufts University, 1996.Adviser: William Sun. Submitted to the Dept. of Drama. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 315-341). Access restricted to members of the Tufts University community. Also available via the World Wide Web;
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Picardie, Michael. "The drama and theatre of two South African plays under apartheid." Link to the Internet, 2009. http://cadair.aber.ac.uk/dspace/handle/2160/3102.
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McCloud, Shonn. "African-American Men and a Journey Through Musical Theatre and Opera." Honors in the Major Thesis, University of Central Florida, 2014. http://digital.library.ucf.edu/cdm/ref/collection/ETH/id/1622.
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The purpose of this study is to outline the origins of African-American men in musical theatre, uncover their contributions to the art form, and explore how their legacy is continued today. I was inspired to do this research because through my undergraduate curriculum I have only narrowly studied African-American men in musical theatre and opera history. Upon realizing the lack of attention to this subject matter, not only in my curriculum but in historical resources, I was inspired to address the need for this research. The courses I have taken included Theatre History 1 and 2 and Musical Theatre History 1 and 2; recognition of African-Americans in the theatrical arts has been discussed at a minimal level. The majority of African-American studies in these classes focus on minstrelsy and its contribution to American musical theatre. Minstrelsy was an American form of entertainment consisting of variety acts, dancing, and music during the early 1900s. The shows were a mockery of African-Americans with white (Sometimes Black) men dressing themselves in clown-like costumes and black face paint to depict a caricature of blacks. Throughout my coursework I have found there is still a presence of Minstrelsy in the framework of American musical theatre today. Understanding how minstrelsy influenced musical theatre led me to research Bert Williams, a pioneer African-American performer both in minstrelsy and American theatre. Bert Williams broke racial barriers, allowing African-Americans to perform alongside whites and gain proper show billing. This not only influenced theatre, but the social temperature of the time as well, as the stereotype of African-Americans in society slowly began to be broken down, and whites having the opportunity to see African-Americans as normal people aided in the seeding and progression of the civil rights movement. To further study the works and life of Bert Williams, I learned and performed his iconic song, "Nobody." The song is a commentary of how Williams is overlooked because he is an African-American man. It talks about how he is expected to be funny and make a mockery of himself at the expense of himself. In researching the historical context and gaining an understanding of the content within the song, I was able to better understand other roles I have played in various musicals. This gave me a different
perspective to the subject matter of racism within a show. Furthermore, it allowed me to view the evolution of African-American roles in musical theatre, and how they originated in vaudevillian shows. A subject of which I had never explored within my classes. Williams had a very successful and influential career and became the basis for my research. However, as I began my exploration, I realized there were a vast variety of men of color who either contributed as much, if not more, to the progression of African-American men in musical theatre and opera. Bert Williams, Todd Duncan, and Paul Robeson all forged careers in musical theatre and/or opera. These men aided in presenting African-American men in realistic settings and not as stereotyped caricatures. African-American men in musical theatre and opera are typically overlooked for their contribution to the art forms. However, Bert Williams, Todd Duncan, and Paul Robeson were trailblazers for African-American men in musical theatre and opera; utilizing their status and fame to make political change and fight for equal rights, both on and off stage. Their legacy is seen in the art form through the structure of musical theatre, the content of the musical comedy that led to the musical drama, and through the integration of the African-American performer in both musical theatre and opera. In continuation of their legacy, we see more roles in shows for African-American men and a growing interest in shows with African-Americans. The recent opening and revivals of shows like Porgy and Bess, Motown: The Musical, and Kinky Boots all feature leading African-American men on stage. My duty as a young African-American practitioner of both musical theatre and opera is to continue their legacy through both my studies and performance. I am honored to be a part of their legacy, furthering their contributions, and bringing light to their stories through my research and analysis.B.F.A.
Bachelors
Theatre
Arts and Humanities
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Castelyn, Sarahleigh. "South African Dance Theatre : The Body as a Site of Struggle." Thesis, Queen Mary, University of London, 2009. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.515401.
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Ekumah-Asamoah, Rachel Ekua. "Theatre, performance and representation : African diasporic identity on the British stage." Thesis, Goldsmiths College (University of London), 2015. http://research.gold.ac.uk/18736/.
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The focus of this thesis is the performance of African diasporic identities through a unique theatre emerging from the second and third generations of peoples and communities of the African Diaspora in Britain. The politics, the dynamics, articulation and representation of these identities on the British stage, forms a major part of this investigation, which also goes beyond the stage to comment on British society itself. The discipline of theatre and performance are appropriate vehicles to research the notion of African diasporic identity because they continue to be an essential part of any nation’s cultural discourse on who, what and why they are. Nadine Holdsworth argues that theatre at a basic level is: intrinsically connected to nation because it enhances “national” life by providing a space for shared civil discourse… Theatre as a material, social and cultural practice, offers the chance to explore histories, behaviours, events and preoccupations in a creative communal realm that opens up potential for reflection and debate. (2010, p. 6) The relationship between the current context of Britain and an emotional or physical link to Africa or the Caribbean and the negotiations that characterize that relationship underpin the examination of the constantly shifting diasporic identities in this study. The theatre coming from these African diaspora communities is exhibiting characters on the British stage that are a reflection of African diasporic individuals who are no longer agreeing to be confined to the margins of society by claiming their rightful place in the public domain, in the centre themselves. The theatre is reflecting that by beginning to move outside the confines of the margins. This investigation looks at a spectrum of African diasporic dramatists and theatre companies, examining how they use the theatre to explore the complex, multifaceted and subtly layered identities that the African in the diaspora has become, whilst revealing whether the current prominence of African diasporic dramatists in the mainstream is only perceived or confirm that indeed African diasporic identity has claimed the space to articulate being ‘here’ and also relating to ‘there.'
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Mabitsela, Lesiba. "Performing Methods of Undress towards a Re-Imagined African Masculine Identity." Master's thesis, Faculty of Humanities, 2019. http://hdl.handle.net/11427/30534.
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In a continent built on competing patriarchal cultures and traditions, the Eurocentric perspective is dominant. The suit/blazer has become a symbol of morality, power, and class that has centred its position via the violent legacy of colonialism and slavery or as Edward Said defines these legacies, via notions of “cultural imperialism”. The purpose of this paper is to inquire whether an aesthetic change from this ideological legacy would ultimately lead to a change in African masculine embodiments. The research identifies and applies multiple references from different applications of embodied resistance: sartorial displays, fashion design, drapery and theories around the gendered body and its relation to clothing for such a purpose – performed hereas „methods of undress‟.
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Long, Khalid Yaya. "PEARL CLEAGE’S A SONG FOR CORETTA: CULTURAL PERFORMATIVITY AS HISTORIOGRAPHICAL DOCUMENTATION." Miami University / OhioLINK, 2011. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=miami1311293741.
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Gardini, Genna. "Handsome Devil: an exploration of contemporary South African girlhood/s through playwriting." Master's thesis, University of Cape Town, 2014. http://hdl.handle.net/11427/13293.
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Araujo, Darron. "Vocal schizophrenia or conscious flexibility? : owning the voice in the South African context." Master's thesis, University of Cape Town, 2009. http://hdl.handle.net/11427/11898.
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Includes abstract.Includes bibliographical references (leaves 56-60).
This thesis questions how and why certain South African performers habitually and unconsciously shift accent in the performance context. I refer to this vocal action as habitual, unconscious accent-based speech adaptation. This examination is made considering that contemporary voice training at the Drama Department of the University of Cape Town (UCT), where the author locates, does not designate any accent as a criterion for performance. Whilst I do not contend habitual, unconscious accent-based speech adaptation to be language-specific this research is English-based. Habitual, unconscious accent-based speech adaptation highlights three primary concerns: the first I term an 'ossification' of sound producing vocal inflexibility; the second is potential class-based exclusion from the performance context; and the third concern is a need for critical awareness in training and performance, evidenced by the preceding concerns. Despite accent-based speech adaptation paradoxically demonstrating the voice's flexibility, when accent-based speech adaptation happens unconsciously and habitually the real flexibility of the voice is negated producing detachment from the performer's own vocal identity or 'vocal schizophrenia' (Rodenburg, 2001: 81).
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Chauke, Lesego. "(Re)membering history: performative disinterment in post-TRC South African theatre-making." Master's thesis, Faculty of Humanities, 2019. https://hdl.handle.net/11427/31654.
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With the socio-political and even the theatre landscape in South Africa being fraught with questions of identity, ownership, memory and self-representation, I’m often struck by the implications of representing the self, while noting that the ‘self’ is never and can never be fully removed from some sense of a collective. This dissertation is a proliferation of questions and provocations that I hope will begin to sketch out an emergent body of South African performance work, particularly by young, Black female makers that centres materiality and corporeality as a device through which to resist the particularly logocentric and text-centric dramaturgy of the South African TRC proceedings. This dissertation will unfold as a kind of discourse analysis, drawing from a range of materials in an attempt to arrive at a theory of performative disinterment. While I draw from critical theory and performance studies, the core concepts that I return to throughout the dissertation are language, materiality and dramaturgy. These are defined primarily in relationship to each other, and it is this relationship that forms the basis for performative disinterment. Performative disinterment, as I conceive of it, is a productive suspicion of history that plays itself out through performance. It encourages a dramaturgy of materiality to give language to and articulate memory as counterpoint to history. I employ theatre and performance as an analytical tool through which to deconstruct the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission looking specifically at the relationship between memory and the representation thereof in the Commission’s proceedings. I turn to Susan Lori Park’s play Venus and Sara Warner’s analysis of the play, focussing on what Warner calls ‘a drama of disinterment’ as a counterpoint to the dramaturgy of the TRC so as to begin to presence a terrain of performance work that employs ‘mis’-representation as a device for theatrical representation-ability. I conclude with an analysis of A Faint Patch of Light (2018), directed by Qondiswa James and They Look at Me and This is All They Think (2006), directed by Nelisiwe Xaba as contemporary South African performances that resists tropes of spectacle and the dominant gaze.
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Abah, O. S. "Popular theatre as a strategy for education and development : The example of some African countries." Thesis, University of Leeds, 1987. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.377853.
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Dubazane, Mlondiwethu. "Touching on the Untouchable: contesting contemporary Black south african masculinity and cultural identity through performance." Master's thesis, Faculty of Humanities, 2021. http://hdl.handle.net/11427/33721.
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As a moment of slipping in, turning away and recovering from; the thinking for this project is focused on understanding through and from within culture. With this the paper begins to weave itself through a guided journey of my own personal accounts and the theorists that align and/or challenge such accounts. It moves between investigating my relationship with my father, to interrogating the ways in which men have spoken specific violence's into existence. This thesis does not look to be the reason of, nor the answer to, the way in which men ‘act'; but it does employ a keen eye into understanding the way in which meanings are produced. The paper then embeds itself in interrogating each of these instances through four different performances that were created by Mlondi Dubazane. These performances should be understood as thinking through and with/in representation and the different mediums that representing takes shape. It is vital to understand that even in its attempt at the poetics, the paper expresses itself through, within, around and beside language. This is but the first attempt of finding a language in speaking about my own maleness, a maleness that is not universal, a maleness that is moving forward in advance of nowhere, a maleness that seeks to dare touch on the untouchable. This, then serves as a written explication of research that seeks to engage the meanings and limitations of contemporary Black south african cultural identity (and in particular, the gendered dimensions of this experience) through the careful and nuanced crafting of public performances that draw on both public and intimate experiences.
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Yerimah, Ahmed Parker. "Changes in the Nigerian theatre, with special attention to four post-Soyinkan playwrights." Thesis, Royal Holloway, University of London, 1986. http://repository.royalholloway.ac.uk/items/7cd5ae30-676d-4de8-b07d-9e1c09efdd55/1/.
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The thesis examines the main conventions governing traditional Nigerian entertainment and the development of these conventions under influences from Western drama. Wole Soyinka's development of these conventions is considered along with his influence on present day play-wrights. The main section of the thesis is concerned with the further evolution of Nigerian theatrical conventions by four playwrights; Zulu Soiola, Wale Ogunyemi, Femi Osofisan and Bode Sowande. The discussion is presented in three parts. In the first chapter, there is a recapitulation and evaluation of the conventions which emerged from traditional Nigerian entertainment by the late 18th and early 19th centuries. The second section consists of two chapters: the first is concerned with the period when there was strong western influence on modern Nigerian drama through the University College at Ibadan, the chapter on Wole Soyinka that follows is concerned with the further evolution of theatrical convention in his drama, the third and major section of the thesis examines the present day development of Nigerian theatrical convention through an analysis of the techniques of the four playwrights; Zulu Sofola, Wale Ogunyemi, Femi Osofisan and Bode Sowande. The material in the thesis includes accounts of interviews with Soyinka, and the four playwrights. It is hoped that this material which has not previously been collected will prove valuable to students of modern Nigerian drama. The aim of the thesis is to provide knowledge, analyse conventions and techniques and stimulate interest in Nigerian drama, particularly, that developed after Soyinka1s successes in the sixties.
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Gaunce, Rachel. "Seeking Alternative Research and Development Methods Through Theatre: A Case Study on Sanitation Issues Affecting Women in the Mathare Slum." Ohio University Honors Tutorial College / OhioLINK, 2018. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=ouhonors1524844274577085.
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Munro, Allan John. "Ambiguity and deception in the covert texts of South African theatre : 1976-1996." The Ohio State University, 1997. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1261072987.
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Munro, Allan John. "Ambiguity and deception in the covert texts of South African Theatre : 1976-1996 /." Connect to resource, 1998. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view.cgi?acc%5Fnum=osu1261072987.
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Redd, Tina. "The struggle for administrative and artistic control of the Federal Theatre Negro units /." Thesis, Connect to this title online; UW restricted, 1996. http://hdl.handle.net/1773/10222.
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Rukuni, Samuel. "Theatre-for-development in Zimbabwe : the Ziya Theatre Company production of Sunrise." Diss., University of Pretoria, 2012. http://hdl.handle.net/2263/27465.
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This dissertation for the M.A. in Creative Writing consists of a full-length play, titled Last Laugh and a mini-dissertation. The mini-dissertation explores the phenomenon of Theatre-for-Development, which differs significantly from the performance tradition of classical African drama. The study identifies ways in which Theatre-for-Development practitioners, animators or catalysts, (interchangeable names given to agents who teach target community members theatre-for-development skills) abandon the conventions of classical African drama performances, in terms of the form of plays, stage management and costumes. They find different and less formal ways to tackle the social problems which the target communities experience. The origins of Classical African drama are traced from the western tradition, from which it borrows heavily, and there is some discussion of the socio-historical conditions that prevailed during the time when African playwrights performed those plays, and the rise of nationalism in colonised African states, which in part influenced their production. This study then examines how the socio-political dynamics in the Zimbabwean post-farm-invasions era gave rise to Theatre-for-Development projects in the newly resettled farming communities that faced social development challenges. Despite the land gains peasants enjoyed, the resettled communities found themselves in places far away from schools, hospitals, shops and social service centres. That was the source of their problems. It will be shown how government sponsored Theatre-for-Development groups to mobilise the people, through theatre, to initiate home-groomed solutions to their social and economic problems during a time when the government was bankrupt and the country’s economy was shattered by the destruction of the agricultural and mining sectors, triggered by the invasions of the white commercial farms. The Ziya Community Theatre’s production of Sunrise is analysed in the light of these considerations.Dissertation (MA)--University of Pretoria, 2012.
English
unrestricted
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Mbothwe, Mandla. "An African Dream Play = Isivuno Sama Phupha : reconstructing the spirit of ubuntu in the contemporary urban 'village' through theatre." Master's thesis, University of Cape Town, 2008. http://hdl.handle.net/11427/8164.
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Includes abstract.Includes bibliographical references (leaves 43-44).
My project proceeds from the question: What might an African Dream Play be for the 21 st Century? Or how might dreams be used to generate content and presentational form as well as to influence the way in which the audience experience or participate in the performance event? My interest in the African Dream Play lies in a belief that it might provide a means of reconstructing the spirit of ubuntu through theatre. It seeks - both in process and presentation - to include in this reconstruction, that which is popularly known as moral regeneration - which I see rather as spiritual regeneration. My contention is that we, and particularly young people, are living in a social and spiritual crisis and the African Dream Play attempts a trans formative intervention within the dynamic fabric of the contemporary urban 'village'-a space of many cultures, languages, ideologies and levels of economic status. This explication sets my practical research and the production Isivuno Sama Phupha in particular, in a theoretical framework and performance historical context. It draws on the theories of Victor Turner, specifically his concepts 'liminality' and 'communitas' and his idea of the social drama. It then traces the evolution of my theatrical research: first through an interest in cultural and religious practices prevalent in the townships around Cape Town and how they might be used to generate material for the theatre and an aesthetics of presentation that could stimulate the communitas experience for both the performers and the audience; then, on to dreams and how they might provide the stimulus for my envisaged theatre by utilizing an experience of their essential liminality.
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Camden, Jacquelynn. "The Voice of Ritual: A Pedagogical Exploration Teaching Body and Breath Using the Principles of Ritual Poetic Drama within the African Continuum." VCU Scholars Compass, 2012. http://scholarscompass.vcu.edu/etd/2754.
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THE VOICE OF RITUAL: AN EXPLORATION TEACHING BODY AND BREATH USING THE PEDAGOGICAL PRINCIPLES OF RITUAL POETIC DRAMA WITHIN THE AFRICAN CONTINUUM By Jacquelynn Rae Camden, MFA Candidate A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Fine Arts Theatre Pedagogy: Voice and Speech & Ritual Poetic Drama Within the African Continuum at Virginia Commonwealth University. Virginia Commonwealth University, 2012 Major Director: Dr. Tawnya Pettiford-Wates, Theatre The focus of my undergraduate training and the concentration of my graduate work have been specifically in two areas: Ritual Poetic Drama Within the African Continuum under the tutelage of Dr. Tawnya Pettiford-Wates, and Voice and Speech with Janet B. Rodgers. I spent my undergraduate years learning and absorbing the material and philosophy of both Rodgers and Pettiford-Wates, and in my first year of graduate work, I was able to study their teaching principles and methodologies within the classroom as a teaching assistant. I was also fortunate enough to study the teaching principles of fellow graduate students within both concentrations: Ritual Poetic Drama Within the African Continuum and Voice & Speech. It is my intention with this thesis, to explain how and why I decided to integrate some of the teaching methodologies of RPDWTAC into the Second Year Voice & Speech course I taught in the fall of 2010, which focused on body and breath. It is my belief that these particular practices of Ritual Poetic Drama within the African Continuum as applied to the Junior Acting Studio are also beneficial in the pedagogy of Voice and Speech in the classroom, because such practices create an environment that encourages the building of an artistic community, personal responsibility, and the freeing of the artist’s body, mind, and spirit, resulting in the freeing of the voice as well.
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Hill, Caroline. "Art versus Propaganda?: Georgia Douglas Johnson and Eulalie Spence as Figures who Fostered Community in the Midst of Debate." The Ohio State University, 2019. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1555276218786986.
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Landers, Marion Rose. "Lost Lesotho princess/landlord ears." Thesis, University of British Columbia, 2008. http://hdl.handle.net/2429/4130.
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This thesis is titled Lost Lesotho Princess/Landlord Ears. It consists of an original play
of the same name based upon the life-story of the author’s paternal grandmother and an
accompanying essay titled “Lost Lesotho Princess/Landlord Ears: Visibility, Invisibility,
Roots and Liminality in the African Diaspora.” The play falls under the following
theatrical categories: African Diaspora drama, black theatre, western Canadian black
theatre, realism, the memory play and to some extent, contemporary existentialism. The
essay is a discussion by the author regarding the dramatic, social and political context of
the play. The following themes are highlighted: history — pertaining to a collective black
history and individual histories and (her)stories, regarding and respecting ones’ elders as
a link to history and Africa, and notions of commonality and difference within the
African Diaspora with attention paid to myths and narratives about what it means to be
‘dark-skinned’ or ‘light-skinned’ in various black communities around the world. The
methods of investigation were: a study of the drama and literature of the African
Diaspora, the dramatic literature of other post-colonial societies and marginalized groups,
one-on-one interviews with Rose Landers, whose experiences are represented by Carrie,
the main character in Lost Lesotho Princess/Landlord Ears and field research at JazzArt -
a dance-theatre company in Cape Town, South Africa. The view-point the play lends
itself to and the conclusions drawn by the essay are: that black people and black
communities need agency and healing, that being of mixed race does not have to equal
psychological confusion and that mixed communities, families and cultures have been
and will continue to be relevant to the universal black experience and the artistic
representation of the African Diaspora. The importance of writing as a form of healing,
resolution and revolution for members of the African Diaspora and the importance of
authorship of ones’ own history is highlighted.
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Williams, Darius Omar. "The Negro Ensemble Company: Beyond Black Fists from 1967 to 1978." The Ohio State University, 2012. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1337951143.
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Sunni-Ali, Asantewa Fulani. "Impact Repertory Theatre as a Tool of Empowerment: Black Youth Describe their Experiences and Perceptions." Digital Archive @ GSU, 2010. http://digitalarchive.gsu.edu/aas_theses/3.
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This qualitative phenomenological study explores the role of Theatre as a tool of empowerment for Black youth. This study involves IMPACT Repertory Theatre of Harlem (IMPACT), a Theatre group that consists of Black youth between the ages of 12-19. Observations, focus-group interviews and audiovisual material were used to explore Black youth's experiences with and perceptions of Theatre via IMPACT. The existing literature surrounding the topic of Theatre for youth empowerment contains the following gaps: they do not give a voice to the youth in question, they are seldom conducted in the U.S. and they do not specifically focus on Black youth. Analysis included categorizing the data and then putting it into themes. In the study’s findings, participants reveal that Theatre via IMPACT offers a source of family like support, a safe space and opportunities for self discovery and transformation.
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Picardie, Michael. "Towards a philosophy of theatre inspired by Aristotle's poetics and post-structuralist aesthetics in relation to three South African plays." Thesis, University of South Wales, 2014. https://pure.southwales.ac.uk/en/studentthesis/towards-a-philosophy-of-theatre-inspired-by-aristotles-poetics-and-poststructuralist-aesthetics-in-relation-to-three-south-african-plays(031e80c8-04cc-4060-86df-770d67477b26).html.
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I have attempted a reading of Aristotle in terms of mimesis, ethos, mythos, lexis, hamartia, anagnorisis, peripeteia, catharsis and anamnesis - as an existential “being there” (Dasein) of the characters’ freedom and actual historicity - in three of my plays in which I performed or witnessed in productions in England, Wales, three Scandinavian countries, the U.S. and South Africa. I have analysed other Southern African “womanist” performative drama and feminist theatre. I assume with the ancient Greeks that in serious theatre there is theoria, an educated, discursive looking, which involves a dialectics of logos in dianoia intertwined in the mythos – ethical truth in the discourse of the plot. Whilst aesthetics cannot be reduced to psychobiography, creative writing is motivated in part by the author’s and the dramatic subjects’ psychoanalytically understood personal and political unconscious placed in the ethos – the character on the stage. The aesthetics of tragedy relate to both peripeteia (reversals) and anagnorisis (recognition of responsibility) which occur within an arc of development, crisis and denouement of the vicissitudes of purported wisdom in understanding how performative drama and critical theatre have been presented in what has become known as The Struggle in a post-apartheid South Africa and post-colonial Zimbabwe by comparison with historical conditions in South America, India, even China. The values of nous, phronesis and sophia, intuitive, practical and interpretative wisdom are connected to the Nicomachean and Eudemian Ethics with which the tragic-comic hero and his Other are imbued or violate. The post-structuralist aesthetic as developed in the literary theory of the twentieth century is essentially the interaction of synchronic and diachronic language emerging from the signifiance and the semiosis of the chora (the feminine or maternal unconscious) within the de-familarisation techniques of Russian and Czech Formalism. This provides a creative and meaningful limit to a consciousness of being-white and beingblack- in-the-world against disempowering Nothingness or perceived Otherness threatening moral beings. Nothingness and the Other are characterised magically and as witch-craft in oral-cultures which deny the unconscious and resort to paranoia and persecution of Otherness in the subject projected onto the other – the “colonial personality”. Shades of Brown has been re-written as Jannie Veldsman – A Film 8 Scenario and I have incorporated into a revised The Cape Orchard a retrospective anticipation of the coming of the new South Africa. I reflect on what tragic drama on the stage and in real life in South Africa means now that the new South Africa is over its honeymoon period and faces serious problems of failed governance. Within the dialectic of an enlightened rabbinical morality of Hillel the Elder (“What is hateful to you do not do to others….” and “If I am not for myself who will be for me…?”) and Kant’s categorical imperative of human beings as a priori ends, I follow the fortunes of an old Jewish veteran of The Struggle, dating back to the Defiance Campaign of 1952/3. Fugard’s work is exemplary in fostering a sense of Sartre’s Nothingness and nihilation which “haunts” Being and is the space of undecidability in relation to my condition of freedom allowing the transcendence of Being. Being asserts reparation and redemption in the face of the depressive and paranoid subject/object split in the subject’s being-in-the-world. Plays ideally submerge this existentialist, psychoanalytic and Aristotelian dramaturgy in the form of Kierkegaard’s faith and Nietzsche’s will which are part of the Encompassing in Karl Jasper’s metaphysics - the residue of a Judaeo-Christian ethics facing the anomie and aporia of the postmodern. The new South Africa was only ostensibly built on Greek and Judaeo- Christian secular ethics – “truth and reconciliation”. It inherited state, revolutionary and criminal violence, as well as a sophisticated economic infrastructure, masspoverty and a segregated educational, social and welfare system which in the milieu of ANC incompetence and corruption have for the very poor got worse but to the benefit of a new African oligarchy, the beneficiaries of a dysfunctional affirmative action policy. What is to be done? Irigaray’s striking metaphor “the speculum of the Other woman” suggests that we are reflected by the instrument we use for investigating what may be Other to us: “we” are westerners trying to live in Africa. “We” are Other – not as autochthonous as the African majority. But the autochthonous can also behave as Other and may even fail to recognise the Other in themselves. Franz Fanon’s “colonial personality”, like ex-president Thabo Mbeki, misunderstands the colonial Other in himself which, disastrously, he projects and attacks in the imaginary and persecutory Other, only to suffer the return of the Real, as do the dramatic fictions Van Tonder in Shades of Brown, Dianne Cupido in The Cape Orchard and Harry Grossman the old man’s son in The Zulu and the Zeide (inspired by a short story by Dan Jacobson). 9 The Russian and Czech Formalists and Structuralists show us how to foreground the Real through techniques of de-familiarisation which can be applied to modernist and post-modernist “womanist” performance drama and feminist theatre. Defamilarisation, especially in an Africa struggling between failed and successful colonialism and often ruled by more or less corrupt elites, sensitizes us to a moral nihilism which characterises the failed African state - described by Conrad as a “heart of darkness” transcended in aletheia – being oneself in the self-showing light of one’s ethos operating through a personal and political unconscious mystified in the rhetoric of oral-cultures. Playwrights such as Yael Farber, Fraser Grace, Aletta Bezuidenhout and Fatima Dike express a semiosis of the unconscious and the signifiance and “absurdity” of logos suggesting that all is not lost in post-apartheid Southern Africa as regards human values, whilst struggling with the political correctness demanded in The Struggle. A partially successful colonialism in parts of Africa could within a British education system, produce a Wole Soyinka who transcends the propaganda of agit-prop by showing the parabolic arc of tragedy afflicted with peripeteia. The weight of African backwardness is not only the negative heritage of colonialism and slavery but Africa’s immersion in traditional partially modernised, but still patriarchal, often tribally and religiously split oral-cultures. These enable the colonial personality to unconsciously or opportunistically exploit his paranoiac sense of his victimage at the expense of the writing-cultures of development which entail anamnesis and the redemption through anagnorisis.
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Lambert, Jade Maia. "Ama Ata Aidoo’s Anowa: Performative Practice and the Postcolonial Subject." Miami University / OhioLINK, 2005. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=miami1133810135.
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Lunga, Violet B. "An examination of an African postcolonial experience of language, culture, and identity, Amakhosi theatre, ako Bulawayo, Zimbabwe." Thesis, National Library of Canada = Bibliothèque nationale du Canada, 1997. http://www.collectionscanada.ca/obj/s4/f2/dsk3/ftp04/nq24330.pdf.
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Mahali, Alude. "A Museum of Bottled Sentiments: the ‘beautiful pain syndrome’ in twenty-first century Black South African theatre making." Doctoral thesis, University of Cape Town, 2014. http://hdl.handle.net/11427/13350.
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Includes bibliographical references.This study is about contemporary black theatre makers and theatre making in the 'now moment'; this moment of recovery and gradual transition after the fall of apartheid in South Africa. The 'now moment', for these theatre makers, is characterized by a deliberate journey inward, in a struggle towards self-determination. The 'now moment' is the impulse prompting the 'beautiful pain syndrome', and through performances of uncomfortable attachments and rites of passage, generates and dwells in the syndrome. Uncomfortable attachments are unsettlement and anxiety wrought by the difficulty of the 'now moment'. These manifest in the work of Black South African-based contemporary theatre makers, Mandla Mbothwe, Awelani Moyo, Mamela Nyamza and Asanda Phewa, within the duality of the 'beautiful pain syndrome'. The 'beautiful pain syndrome' is a cultural dis-ease revealed by the individual theatre makers through the aesthetic interpretation, or beautiful consideration of inherently painful material – a condition or predicament that best contains and yet attempts to unpack this shifting impulse of the 'now' moment. The works around which this study revolves, namely Mbothwe's Ingcwaba lendoda lise cankwe ndlela (the grave of the man is next to the road) (2009), Moyo's Huroyi Hwang – De/Re Composition (2007), Nyamza's Hatched (2009) and Phewa's A Face Like Mine (2008) are rites of passage works, representing a passage or transition from one phase of life to another, which occurs on multiple levels. Through guiding thinking tools, which include intuition, my own positioning, observation and comparative and cultural performance analysis, the four selected works are described, probed and, interrogated; with their purposes and poetics investigated and articulated in different ways. The study does not complete the assignment of unpacking the four works but continues to wonder and worry at them, while investigating a particular aesthetic of dis-ease through the artistic assemblage of symbolic categories. These rites of passage works reflect or echo the transitions in the country's shifting identity, along with the identities of the individuals who inhabit it.
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Ndounou, Monica. "The color of Hollywood: The cultural politics controlling the production of African American original screenplays, stage plays and novels adapted into films from 1980 to 2000." The Ohio State University, 2007. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1180535612.
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House, Melanie J. "Their Place on the South African Stage:The Peninsula Dramatic Society and the Trafalgar Players." The Ohio State University, 2010. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1291211511.
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Owens, Kelli. "The Oppression and Sexism of African-American Women: Then and Now: Substantial Contributions to the History of Musical Theatre." Honors in the Major Thesis, University of Central Florida, 2014. http://digital.library.ucf.edu/cdm/ref/collection/ETH/id/1631.
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A wise Martin Luther King Jr. once said, "Freedom is never given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed (King 1)." For as long as men and women have shared the planet, sexism has been a universal issue in civilization. In a social justice context, American society has found ways to oppress people for centuries. The Oxford Dictionary defines sexism as a "prejudice, stereotyping, or discrimination, typically against women, on the basis of sex ("sexism")." Voting rights in America were established in 1790, but it took years of petitioning at various women's rights conventions before the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution stating "the right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex" was passed in 1920 ("Nineteenth Amendment"). Traditionally, men were supposed to be the strong, decisive, driven, courageous, money-making breed, while women were expected to be the nurturing, affectionate, weak subordinates. Today, we find men and women working in careers previously linked with sexism; men as nurses and teachers, women as CEOs and factory workers. Statistics show that today there are an increasing number of women providing the financial support in their families. As with sexism, people also have been oppressed by racism for centuries. According to The Oxford Dictionary, racism is defined as a "prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism directed against someone of a different race based on the belief that one's own race is superior ("racism")." It has been argued that African Americans have been one of the most oppressed groups in America. Even after they were emancipated in 1865, it was nearly one hundred years later that their rights were protected with the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Before the act's passing, African Americans were denied equal education, employment, housing property, and a political voice. My interest in this topic was peaked right around the same time I became interested in performing on the musical theatre stage. I got my start in local community theatres, and up until college, was the only African American cast in the productions. I started playing multiple ensemble roles per show, and throughout the years advanced myself to "supporting character" but never the lead. Admittedly, there were times when I wasn't as talented as the women who snagged the leading roles, but many a time when I was just as talented or more qualified for the role, it went to another woman - most times of Caucasian descent. What did they have that I didn’t have? When I got accepted into The University of Central Florida as a BFA Musical Theatre student, I auditioned for the plays and musicals every semester, and each season I began to see the same patterns of who was cast for each show. Roles I thought I would get often went to White actors. I felt victimized in this modern-day example of racism. But racism goes beyond black and White. Internal racism between the light-skinned and dark-skinned African American women I was competing with became a factor as well. There were many times when an audition notice called for an African American woman; however, an unsettling trend became very apparent to me; if the casting description was for a maid, or something of that nature, larger, dark-skinned women would get the majority of the callbacks, which would lead to them getting cast. On the flip side, if an audition notice called for an African American ingénue type, more of the slimmer, lighter-skinned women were called back and later cast. Has American society cast a racial stigma for African American beauty?B.F.A.
Bachelors
Theatre
Arts and Humanities
Musical Theatre
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Lambert, Jade Maia. "Ama Ata Aidoo's Anowa performative practice and the postcolonial subject /." Connect to this document online, 2005. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc%5Fnum=miami1133810135.
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Thesis (M.A.)--Miami University, Dept. of Theatre, 2005.Title from first page of PDF document. Document formatted into pages; contains [1], iv, 57 p. Includes bibliographical references (p. 56-57).
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Kimaiyo, Purity J. "Performance for ethnography, dialogue, and intervention| Using activating theatre to explore the reproductive health issues facing Kenyan adolescent girls." Thesis, East Carolina University, 2015. http://pqdtopen.proquest.com/#viewpdf?dispub=1583693.
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This thesis explores the utility of using performance, specifically activating theatre, both as a reproductive health intervention and as an ethnographic tool for exploring the reproductive health worldview of 17 adolescent girls, all peer counselors at a state-run all-girl boarding school in Rift Valley Province, Kenya. The study is grounded theoretically in the traditions of action research, critical ethnography, performance theory, and dialogic expression. I facilitated a week-long activating theatre workshop that included warm-ups, bridge work, improvisation, and activating material. The workshop, which was video recorded, was analyzed alongside a reflective journal and audio recorded semi-structured interviews and a post-workshop focus group for core themes and categories using grounded theory. My analysis shows that the use of activating theatre is an effective tool for understanding the reproductive health perceptions of adolescent girls, for encouraging them to openly discuss their reproductive health issues, for increasing their sense of agency, for improving their decision-making skills, and for helping them critically assess the social and historical roots of reproductive health issues. The project web site which includes workshop video clips is at http://purityjerop.wix.com/kapkenda-performance.
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Rosen, Gary. "Frank Staff and his role in South African ballet and musical theatre from 1955 to 1959, including a pre-1955 biography." Doctoral thesis, University of Cape Town, 1998. http://hdl.handle.net/11427/26564.
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Frank Staff was the first South African choreographer to explore the concept of modem ballet in South Africa. Through the creation of his ballet companies, the South African Ballet and later the Frank Staff Ballet, he pursued unusual subject-matter not seen previously on a South African ballet stage. This thesis explores his legacy to South African dance and is divided into ten chapters with a separate introduction and conclusion. The aim, from the outset, has been to trace Frank Staff's career with particular reference to his choreographic contribution to ballet and musical theatre in South Africa. Appraised throughout in terms of critical opinion and dancers' commentaries, the study is chronologically based with emphasis on individual works created by Staff. There is an overview of Staff's early career, the rationale being to trace the earlier part of his career (from 1933 to 1952) in order to provide a basis from which Staff's most creative phase, i.e. that of the 1950's, might be explored. Staff's subsequent return to South Africa and possible reasons for choosing Johannesburg as his domicile are alluded to, as well as his vision for a new Johannesburg ballet company, the creation of the Frank Staff Ballet School and the South African Ballet Company. The South African Ballet's first regional tour to Benoni followed by a short tour to Kimberley and Vereeniging before returning to Pretoria for further performances is detailed and an examination of the South African Ballet's second Johannesburg season in November 1955 is made. An investigation into Staff's choreographic contribution to Leslie French's 1956 Johannesburg production of The Tempest as well as Staff's early involvement with Brian Brooke's musical theatre encapsulates his important contribution to South African musical theatre, which was a major interest throughout his life. 1957 was the most important and prolific period for Staff and his latest choreographic achievements demonstrates a broadening of his creative powers and a reaching out for previously unused influences in terms of dance and subject matter. The thesis' conclusion includes some of the possible frustrations Staff might have encountered as a choreographer working in South Africa during the 1960's and alludes to his Afro-centric works before his illness and untimely death in 1971.
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Cox, Frances Jayne. "The notion of physicality in vocal training for the performer in South African theatre, with particular reference to the Alexander technique." Thesis, Rhodes University, 1991. http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1002366.
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Voice training has been influenced by separatist attitudes which have allowed for classes which train the body to be separate from those which train the voice. This study acknowledges that to train an actor in separate compartments and then expect the completeness of human expression in performance, is to train under false pretences. There is a need to address the imbalance of separatism and this is examined within the context of voice training. An holistic approach to voice training forms the basis of the argument, which focuses on the need to re-educate the notion of physicality in voice training. Chapter one proposes an understanding of the notion of physicality by drawing on the attitudes of selected theatre practitioners towards the physical nature of the theatre encounter. The expressive energies of the actor's body are responsible for the physicalisation of a play; for this reason the movement of voice and speech is not only examined as source movement, but also as the movement of an actor's response and communication. Chapter two examines some practices which led to attitudes of separatism in voice training, and introduces prevalent practices which are attempting to involve the energy of the physical experience. Chapter three proposes that the Alexander technique be used as the foundation for an awareness of individual physicality. Where chapter one examines the theory of this notion, chapter three proposes an experiential understanding of the same. The Alexander technique is a training in effective body use and it's principles are fundamental to an awareness of body use and functioning. It is argued that these principles should underlie a re-education of physicality. The final chapter of the thesis argues for physicality in South African voice training programmes which would complement the physicality of contemporary theatre forms. It is hoped that this study will provide further incentive for the continued review and adjustment of drama training in South Africa.
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Gilliam-Smith, Rhonda. "FREEDOM ACTS: A HISTORICAL ANALYSIS OF THE STUDENT NON-VIOLENT COORDINATION COMMITTEE AND ITS RELATIONSHIP TO THEATRE OF THE OPPRESSED." Oxford, Ohio : Miami University, 2008. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc%5Fnum=miami1218820340.
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Symons, andrea L. D. "Unrapping the Gangsta: The Changing Role of the Performer from Toast to Gangsta Rap." W&M ScholarWorks, 2003. https://scholarworks.wm.edu/etd/1539626389.
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Haxton, Robert Peter. "Refusal and rupture as a postdramatic revolt : an analysis of selected South African contemporary devised performances with particular focus on works by First Physical Theatre Company and the Rhodes University Drama Department." Thesis, Rhodes University, 2014. http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1015671.
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This mini-thesis investigates the concepts of refusal and rupture as a postdramatic revolt and how these terms can be applied and read within the context of analysing contemporary devised performance in South Africa. The argument focuses on the efficacy of Hans-Thies Lehmann’s postdramatic terminology and the potential of its use in an appreciation of contemporary performance analysis. I investigate the potential in South African contemporary devised performance practice to challenge prevailing modes of traditional dramatic expectation in order to restore the experience of discovery and questioning in the spectator. This research is approached through a qualitative process which entails a reading and application of selected critical texts to the analysis with an application of Lehmann’s terminology. This reading/application is engaged in a dialogue with the interpretative and experiential aspects of selected South African devised performances with particular focus on four cross-disciplinary works selected for analysis. Chapter One functions as an introduction to the concept of postdramatic theatre and the application of the terms refusal and rupture as deconstructive keywords in the process of a devised performance. Chapter Two is an analysis of several South African contemporary performances with particular focus on Body of Evidence (2009) by Siwela Sonke Dance Company, Wreckage (2011) a collaboration by Ubom! Eastern Cape Drama Company and First Physical Theatre Company, Discharge (2012) by First Physical Theatre Company, and Drifting (2013) by The Rhodes University Drama Department. This mini-thesis concludes with the idea that with an understanding of refusal and rupture in a postdramatic revolt, contemporary devised performance achieves an awakening in its spectators by deconstructing the expectation of understanding and the need for resolve; the assumption and need for traditional dramatic structures and rules are challenged. Instead, it awakes an experience of discovery and questioning.
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Makhale, Lerato Michelle. "Dunoon, iKasi lami (my township): young people and the performance of belonging in a South African township." Thesis, University of the Western Cape, 2013. http://hdl.handle.net/11394/3970.
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Magister Artium - MAThis study focuses on young people and how they etch a sense of belonging in the cosmopolitan city of Cape Town, in multicultural, post-apartheid South Africa. The study mainly focuses on a group of performers known as Black Ink Arts Movement (Black Ink), who are based in Du Noon township, near Cape Town, South Africa. The study looks at how young people who are involved in community performance projects; it also engages with their varied audiences. Lastly, the thesis shows the performers’ day to day lives when they are not on stage to see what it means to be young and black in Du Noon as a member of Black Ink
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Hayes, Jeffreen M. "Real Talk: Blackness and Whiteness in the Works of Jefferson Pinder, Dave Chappelle, and Aaron McGruder." W&M ScholarWorks, 2012. https://scholarworks.wm.edu/etd/1539623598.
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"Real Talk: Blackness and Whiteness in the Works of Jefferson Pinder, Dave Chappelle, and Aaron McGruder" will examine twenty-first century constructions of race by African Americans. I am interested in how visual artist Jefferson Pinder, comedian Dave Chappelle, and comic artist Aaron McGruder interrogate and incorporate race, particularly whiteness, into their respective works. Each artist challenges hegemonic constructions of race, utilizing technology and taking full advantage of our visualized culture to present their examinations of race. I selected the artists because of their intimate knowledge of their respective crafts, their use of popular culture, and their diverse perspectives on race in America. Additionally, the artists share a regional background in that they came of age while living in the Washington, DC metro area, which I believe heavily informs their racial views.;Inside their world of the visual arts, comic strips, and television, I argue that the artists are examining blackness while re-defining what it means and inserting, visually, whiteness into the discourse. These black constructions of race have always existed; however, I suggest that the post-soul generation is expanding concepts of race by taking the constructions from the shadows of African American culture and situating them in mainstream culture. In this attempt to challenge homogenous notions of race, the artists cull from several disciplines, which call for an interdisciplinary approach. Employing an interdisciplinary method, I will use theories of race and theories of representation. Additionally, theoretical approaches from art history, visual culture, studies of television, and film studies help frame and ground my research. This twenty-first century discourse from African American cultural workers makes my dissertation timely because it captures an important transition in American culture carried out through the combination of art, media, and racial discourse.