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Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Dramatic criticism Dramatic criticism Theater Theater Theater Theater'
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Orand, Amber Werley Darden Bob. "A quantitative analysis of theater criticism in four American newspapers." Waco, Tex. : Baylor University, 2008. http://hdl.handle.net/2104/5169.
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Georges, Pierre Marie. "Dramatic space : Jerzy Grotowski and the recovery of the ritual function of theatre." Thesis, McGill University, 2002. http://digitool.Library.McGill.CA:80/R/?func=dbin-jump-full&object_id=32820.
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This thesis explores temporal forms of architectural meaning through the investigation of the dramatic space of "ritual theatre." In particular, it analyzes the thought and several theatrical productions of the twentieth century Polish theatre director, Jerzy Grotowski: Grotowski is of particular interest because he designed a "total dramatic space" that incorporated both the actors and the spectators (although without necessarily integrating them) for each of his dramatic works. In each case, the spatial relationships created by the theatrical architecture were indissolubly connected to the meaning of the drama itself. In this way, space was used as a kind of third protagonist that, along with the actors and spectators, participates in the theatrical ritual.
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Lane, Michelle I. ""Why do hurt people hurt people?" A SERIES OF CASE STUDIES EXPLORING ABUSIVE RELATIONSHIPS IN DRAMATIC TEXTS AND ONSTAGE WITH TONI KOCHENSPARGER'S MILKWHITE." Ohio University Honors Tutorial College / OhioLINK, 2017. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=ouhonors1492704228702652.
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Wright, Elizabeth Helena. "Virginia Woolf and the dramatic imagination." Thesis, St Andrews, 2008. http://hdl.handle.net/10023/510.
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Reiger, Bryon E. "The Killing Noise of the Out of Style." ScholarWorks@UNO, 2017. http://scholarworks.uno.edu/td/2355.
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Burnett, Linda Avril. "The argument against tragedy in feminist dramatic re-vision of the plays of Euripides and Shakespeare /." Thesis, McGill University, 1998. http://digitool.Library.McGill.CA:80/R/?func=dbin-jump-full&object_id=35857.
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This dissertation examines the arguments against tragedy offered by feminist playwrights in their "re-visions" of the plays of Euripides and Shakespeare.In the first part, I maintain that feminist dramatic re-vision is one manifestation of an unrecognized tradition of women's writing in which criticism is expressed through fiction. I also argue that the project of feminist dramatic re-vision embodies a feminist "new poetics."
In the second part, I examine the aesthetics and politics of tragedy from a feminist perspective. Feminist arguments against tragedy are, in effect arguments against patriarchy. But it is the theorists and critics of tragedy---not the playwrights---who are unequivocally aligned with patriarchy. Playwrights like Euripides and Shakespeare can be seen to destabilize tragedy in their plays.
In the third part, I show how recent feminist playwrights (Jackie Crossland, Dario Fo and Franca Rame, Deborah Porter, Caryl Churchill and David Lan, Maureen Duffy, Alison Lyssa, The Women's Theatre Group and Elaine Feinstein, Joan Ure, Margaret Clarke, and Ann-Marie MacDonald) counter tragedy by extrapolating from the arguments presented by Euripides and Shakespeare in The Medea, The Bacchae, King Lear, Hamlet, Romeo and Juliet and Othello , and by allocating voice and agency to their female protagonists.
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Craig, Jennifer J. "Inventing 'living emblems' : emblem tradition in the masques of Ben Jonson, 1605-1618." Thesis, University of Glasgow, 2009. http://theses.gla.ac.uk/1307/.
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While it is widely held that Ben Jonson uses emblem tradition in the development of imagery in his court masques and entertainments, how or why Jonson employs this genre of word-image combinations is rarely addressed. This thesis offers an explanation for what is often assumed in studies of Jonson’s masques and entertainments. Rather than identifying particularly emblematic scenes or characters and analysing their construction, however, this investigation of the emblematic in Jonson begins with analysis of his theory of masque creation. The evidence he leaves in the introductions to masque publications and his notes in Discoveries (1641) points to a conscious decision to incorporate not emblems themselves but an emblematic method in his new literary masque form, especially between 1605 and 1618. Once Jonson’s familiarity with emblematic methods is realized, what is considered ‘emblematic’ in his imagery can be reassessed. The reason why Jonson’s masques appear to retain emblematic qualities but contain few true emblems can thus be explained. In order to explicate Jonson’s use of emblem tradition in his creation of masque imagery, this thesis is divided into three parts. The first part outlines Jonson’s theory of masque writing within three contexts. It initially looks at how Jonson’s literary methods compare to contemporary emblem and symbol theories, and thus works out a methodology for analysing the emblematic in his masques. Then, it considers the awareness of emblems in the early modern British court, both in material and intellectual culture. In so doing, these two sections on emblems in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century British culture highlight the prevalence of the emblematic mindset in Jonson and his aristocratic audience. This argues for the relevance of Jonson’s emblematic development of imagery for performances in the Stuart court. The second and third parts of this thesis then turn to the masques and entertainments themselves. Part II looks at how Jonson uses emblematic techniques to design characters. Recognizing Jonson’s different approaches to abstract personifications and mythological figures, it is split into two sections. The first section looks at key personifications in The Masque of Beautie (1608) and The Masque of Queenes (1609). It considers how Jonson changes the characters Januarius and Fama bona from personifications in Ripa’s Iconologia to emblematically-rendered figures. The second section then analyses Jonson’s reinvention of stock characters Cupid and Hercules. Discussion covers Cupid’s appearance in many of Jonson’s entertainments, and then concentrates on his appearance with Anteros in A Challenge at Tilt (1613) and Loves Welcome at Bolsover (1634). Hercules’ pointedly emblematic role in Pleasure reconcild to Vertue (1618) finally crowns study of Jonson’s characters. Part III extends investigation into Jonson’s development of themes and arguments in the masques. By identifying Jonson’s processes in the expression of certain themes, this part gives a full picture of Jonson’s use of emblematic techniques and material. The first section realizes their use in the moulding of Platonic themes of love into celebration of King and State. The second section then scrutinizes the invention of the Masques of Blacknesse (1605) and Beautie, Love Freed (1611), and The Golden Age Restor’d (1615). This is followed by analysis of the changes Jonson makes to emblematic constructions between Pleasure reconcild and its rewrite For the Honour of Wales (1618). The alterations highlight Jonson’s reliance on emblematic interpretation of his entertainments. At the same time, it marks his decision to subvert his techniques after 1618 in order to cater to court tastes following the failure of Pleasure reconcild. A conclusion to this thesis is thus derived from the comparison, which illustrates Jonson’s methods up to 1618.
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Park, Kyung Ran. "Philomela and her sisters : explorations of sexual violence in plays by British contemporary women dramatists." Thesis, University of Warwick, 1998. http://wrap.warwick.ac.uk/55822/.
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The theme of this thesis is women and violence explored in eleven plays by British contemporary women playwrights in the 1980s and 1990s. In order to explore these plays, I have made investigations into a basic knowledge of violence against women in the Introduction. Violence against women is also called sexual violence or gender-related violence. The knowledge I have gained includes how sexual violence is defined; why sexual violence occurs; what kinds of sexual violence there are; how people perceive sexual violence. My definition is that any act which limits the autonomy of women constitutes sexual violence. Based on a variety of definitions by feminist scholars, there are many forms of sexual violence in women's history around the world. As a result, I have found out the continuity, diversity, and universality of women's pain. The nature of sexual violence has been mistaken by many people from the perspective of prevailing myths about women's sexuality. Because of them, many women and female children become double victims. Having understood the true nature of sexual violence, I have selected eleven plays which explore women and violence: The Love of the Nightingale (1988) by Timberlake Wertenbaker; Crux (1991) by April de Angelis; The Taking of Liberty (1992) by Cheryl Robson; Augustine (Big Hysteria) (1991) by Anna Furse; The Gut Girls (1988) by Sarah Daniels; Ficky Stingers (1986) by Eve Lewis; Beside Herself (1990) by Sarah Daniels; Thatcher's Women (1987) by Kay Adshead; Money to Live (1984) by Jacqueline Rudet; Low Level Panic (1988) by Clare McIntyre; Masterpieces (1984) by Sarah Daniels. The thesis is divided into two parts depending on whether the plays are set in the past or present in order to identify the continuity of sexual violence. They depict the exercise of men's power through sexual violence. In the plays women experience violence committed by men and then they are silenced. However, the women demonstrate their fighting spirit and regain their voice or find ways to express themselves. Women's hope for change is expressed through theatre.
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Koutsourakis, Angelos. "'A film should be like a stone in your shoe' : a Brechtian reading of Lars von Trier." Thesis, University of Sussex, 2011. http://sro.sussex.ac.uk/id/eprint/7458/.
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This central premise of this thesis is that Lars von Trier is a political director. Through a detailed formal analysis of five films I proceed to discuss the political implications of form, something that has not been acknowledged by scholarship so far. In this thesis, I employ Brecht as a methodological tool so as to discuss the shift from a dialectical cinema devoted to the production of knowledge effects, to a post-Brechtian one that brings together points of tension that remain unresolved. Chapter 1 proceeds to a historical evaluation of Brecht's reception in film theory and considers the ways that Brecht's theory and practice can address the cinematic and political concerns of the present. The chapter also locates von Trier under the rubric of the post-Brechtian by comparing him to past film practices. Chapter 2 moves to a discussion of von Trier's Europa trilogy and focuses on issues of historical representation. Emphasis is placed on formal elements that challenge the narrative laws of classical cinema. The chapter argues that von Trier follows Brecht's mistrust of a historical representation based on pictorial verisimilitude, without however sharing his forward-looking politics and his view of history as Marxist science. Chapter 3 discusses Dogme 95 and The Idiots (1998). Firstly, the chapter discusses Dogme's combination of a political modernist rhetoric with a realist one and places Dogme's return to the past in a historical context. Secondly, the chapter considers the role of performance as a formal and thematic element in The Idiots. I draw attention to the ways that the camera becomes performative and brings together material of dramaturgical importance with moments that are the product of cinematic contingency. My discussion is very much informed by contemporary post-Brechtian performance and film studies invested in the discussion of ‘corporeal cinema'. Chapter 4 discusses Dogville, a film with obvious references to Brecht. Unlike previous readings, I shift the emphasis from the film's assumed ‘Anti-Americanism' and proceed to a formal analysis that can rethink the film's politics and innovations. While Brecht has been thought to be as a fleeting presence in von Trier's films by most critics, this thesis suggests that our knowledge of von Trier's formal innovations can be deepened and enlivened by discussing them in conjunction with Brecht's theory. By returning to Brecht, we can also rethink the importance of form as the key to a film's politics.
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Hartwell, Jonathan William. "'Skill in the construction' : dramaturgy, ideology, and interpretation in Shakespeare's late plays." Thesis, University of Birmingham, 2004. http://etheses.bham.ac.uk//id/eprint/4484/.
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This thesis examines the way dramaturgical techniques in Shakespeare's late plays are used to create a complex and radical exploration of the relationship between ideology and interpretation. It links such concerns via the multiple meanings of "construction", illustrated using the scene of reading at the end of Cymbeline, centred upon the prophetic label. In Part I, major reservations are expressed about the standard interpretative paradigms applied to late Shakespearian drama, and their effect on critical understanding. The deficiencies of a "Romance" reading and the problems with traditional attitudes to chronology, authorship, and collaboration are stressed; elements often marginalized as aesthetically inferior are defended; and two related areas of dramaturgical technique, theatrical spectacle and reported action, are emphasized. Part II focuses on reading individual late plays, with special emphasis on Henry VIII and The Two Noble Kinsmen. It adopts a reconstructed, politicized close reading, concentrating on issues relating to the problematics of interpretation within the plays. Individual chapters highlight different forms of "construction": art, history, truth, authority, display, narrative. Attention is drawn to how reading and interpretation are shown to be always inscribed within power relations and the performative dynamic of language.
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Bose, Sarika Priyadarshini. "Women as figures of disorder in the plays of Oscar Wilde." Thesis, University of Birmingham, 1999. http://etheses.bham.ac.uk//id/eprint/5081/.
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Oscar Wilde's plays on upper-class Victorian society are set apart from contemporary drama both by their wit and their reappraisal of conventions, particularly in dealing with transgressive women. The fallen woman's prominence in popular culture and the stage during a period of intense suffragism attests to woman's role as a touchstone of moral stability, contemporary plays viewing deviant women as threats to a man's world. Wilde mocks society's confinement of women, fallen or not, into prescribed roles and undercuts customary morality but fears self-determining women's disruptive power. A tool of perceiving this ambivalence is the self-fashioning dandy, who repudiates social constraints and yet foils transgressive women's attempts at self-fashioning. The surface mockery of conventional fears of female aspirations as threats to masculine orderliness conceals a greater fear of female autonomy as a threat to masculinity itself. This study locates the dramatic and moral urgency of Wilde's five major plays, Lady Windermere's Fan, A Woman of No Importance, An Ideal Husband, The Importance of Being Earnest and Salome in this conflicting response to the feminine, which also determines his choice of theme and form both in his comedies of manners and symbolic drama.
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Garafalo, Sanner. "'Most wonderful!' : a contextual study of twinship in early modern drama and Shakespeare's plays." Thesis, University of Birmingham, 2013. http://etheses.bham.ac.uk//id/eprint/3937/.
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This thesis examines twins as objects of wonder in early modern drama. In Wonders and the Order of Nature: 1150-1750, Lorraine Daston and Katharine Park divide the experience of wonder into three separate emotional reactions: horror, repugnance, and pleasure. The thesis builds on this model, arguing that, as objects of wonder, twins were capable of inspiring this range of emotional responses which could, consequently, be capitalized on in a dramatic work. The first three chapters consider non-Shakespearean drama and its depiction of twins as wonderful, tracing how twins emerge as either objects of horror, repugnance, or pleasure in these plays and how these depictions resonate with other circulating discussions of twinship. Chapter 1 examines the horrific depiction of twins in The Duchess of Malfi and The Cruel Brother and its relation to the monstrous and prodigious birth of the early modern broadside. Chapter 2 investigates the repugnant twins of The twins and The Love-sick Court in light of the early modern medical understanding of twins as errors in nature. And Chapter 3 begins to reveal how more pleasurable associations can override these horrific and repugnant connotations, as shown in Changes, Ignoramus, and Senile Odium. However, all of this builds toward a final analysis of Shakespeare’s The Comedy of Errors and Twelfth Night, demonstrating how Shakespeare fully transitions twinship into the realm of the pleasurable, combatting the negative cultural assumptions about twinship with an alternate and largely revolutionary depiction of twinship as a positive characteristic.
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Ash, Cassandra Kay. "'Look About You' : a critical edition." Thesis, University of Birmingham, 2015. http://etheses.bham.ac.uk//id/eprint/6170/.
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This is a critical edition of the unattributed Admiral’s Men comedy 'Look About You', first published in 1600. The playtext has been treated according to standard editing practice: spelling and punctuation modernized, scene divisions imposed, and changes to the text collated. Full critical apparatus, including textual commentary and an expository introduction, accompanies the play. This edition views the text as a practical theatrical document, looking to performative and stageable choices first, and to thematic, stylistic, and generic influences second. The introduction is framed as a series of contextual narratives, applying methodologies from attribution and repertory studies to discuss the possibilities of authorship and date of composition. Once situated in its repertorial context (plays written for the performance at the Rose theatre between 1598-1600), the introductory matter interprets adaptation of source texts, verbal influences from contemporary drama and non-dramatic literature, and generic trends to determine a probable date of composition in 1599. The emphasis is on understanding how 'Look About You' interacts within contemporary dramatic works and how it functions as a piece meant for performance. Sections of the introduction examine these more practical aspects through dramaturgical structure, staging conditions, casting and doubling requirements, and an extended editorial practices section.
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Midhin, Majeed Mohammed. "The artist as a dramatic character in contemporary British drama : a critical study of Stoppard, Barker and Wertenbaker." Thesis, University of Essex, 2017. http://repository.essex.ac.uk/20011/.
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The focus of this dissertation is the representation of the artist as a character in British theatre. In this study, which includes three chapters and one introductory chapter, I attempt to show that British playwrights, whether male or female, use their main fictional characters as artists either for self-reflexivity or to comment on the situation of being an artist. In accordance with the above premise, the responsibility of the artist and the function of art is investigated with due reference to radical thinkers, philosophers and writers such as, among others, Immanuel Kant, Oscar Wilde, Georg Lukács, Antonio Gramsci, Walter Benjamin, Viktor Shklovsky, Bertolt Brecht and Jean-Paul Sartre. This investigation concentrates on the conceptualization and contribution of those intellectuals to the definition of the role of the artist. Though I focus mainly on the period from the 1970s to the 2000s onwards, by analysing the dramatic texts of three British playwrights: Tom Stoppard, Howard Barker, and Timberlake Wertenbaker, I also discuss the decade following John Osborne’s Look Back in Anger (1956). In this manner, I trace the key changes that have taken place in British theatre during the second half of the 20th century. Though there is an abundance of critical material on the subject which focuses on the figure of the artist to show self-referral for the dramatist, the present thesis goes beyond that to highlight the role and responsibility of the artist in British theatre, the function of art, the potential dilemmas he or she may confront and the economic and political circumstances surrounding them. The plays examined in this thesis range from those depicting the problematic role of the artist as an intellectual, who is torn between morality and immorality, as in Stoppard’s Artist Descending a Staircase (1972) and Travesties (1974), to those which reject the utilitarian function of art, for example Barker’s No End of Blame: Scenes of Overcoming (1981) and Scenes from an Execution (1984). In the case of Wertenbaker, I highlight the role and dilemmas of female artists as they use theatre as a means to show the hegemonic political and economic constraints imposed on their artistic creativity. By analysing several of Wertenbaker’s plays which centre on the use of the artist as a character, her Three Birds Alighting on a Field (1991) and The Line (2009), reflect the relationship between male and female artists and the dilemmas they faced. This thesis poses the following questions: as a fictional character, how can the artist function as a member of a certain community whilst at the same time retain the distinctiveness of his or her role as an outsider? Is he or she committed to the creative work or to the social usefulness of society? If so, can we expect art or the artist to have the answer to society’s problems? Or is that an overly high expectation to place on the artist? How did artists feel living in a society under censorship? How can they avoid being censored? And if they failed, what is the price of free expression? Springing from the discussion about the dilemmas of the artist in British theatre, it will become apparent how these dilemmas, represented by fictional characters, bring forth the dominant plays about artists. Within the framework of the above mentioned playwrights, it is demonstrated that the pressing dilemma which radical artists are faced with nowadays are multiple: social, commercial and political.
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Huston-Findley, Shirley A. "Subverting the dramatic text : folklore, feminism, and the images of women in three canonical American plays /." free to MU campus, to others for purchase, 1998. http://wwwlib.umi.com/cr/mo/fullcit?p9901243.
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Arreola, Dora A. "Staging Through Rituals: Directorial Exploration of The Imaginary Invalid." Amherst, Mass. : University of Massachusetts Amherst, 2009. http://scholarworks.umass.edu/theses/266/.
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Cook, Amy. "Shakespeare, the illusion of depth, and the science of parts an integration of cognitive science and performance studies /." Connect to a 24 p. preview or request complete full text in PDF format. Access restricted to UC campuses, 2006. http://wwwlib.umi.com/cr/ucsd/fullcit?p3217529.
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Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of California, San Diego and University of California, Irvine, 2006.Title from first page of PDF file (viewed September 5, 2006). Available via ProQuest Digital Dissertations. Vita. Includes bibliographical references (p. 253-272).
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Rogers, Jami. "Shakespeare and the thirties : representations of the past in contemporary performance." Thesis, University of Birmingham, 2011. http://etheses.bham.ac.uk//id/eprint/2855/.
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This thesis examines the performance history of Shakespeare focusing on those productions performed as a period analogue of the nineteen-thirties. It engages with the material in two ways. It first attempts to locate influences that have led to the development of this style of performance, finding correlations with both theatrical and televisual drama. It then examines the productions as performed, focusing on the construction of scenography and actor performances. Throughout the analysis, this thesis engages with shifts in the representation of the historical past on both stage and screen.
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Pukszta, Claire A. "Myrrha Now: Reimagining Classic Myth and Mary Zimmerman's Metamorphoses in the #metoo Era." Scholarship @ Claremont, 2019. https://scholarship.claremont.edu/scripps_theses/1374.
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This paper represents the final culmination of a theater senior project. The project consisted of an analytical research paper, performance in a mainstage department production, and supporting process documentation. I portrayed Myrrha, Hunger, Zeus, and others in a production of the play Metamorphoses.
Through research on Mary Zimmerman’s 1998 play Metamorphoses, adapted from the works of Roman poet Ovid, this thesis grapples with the historical meaning of the myth of Myrrha. A polarizing figure, Myrrha was cursed to fall in lust with her father. By exploring of portrayals sexual assault onstage, I tackle themes of audience relationships to trauma and taboo subjects. I seek to understand the importance of her story in a modern context, specifically considering the #metoo movement and increasingly public discussions around sexual violence, rape culture, and systematic oppression. I stress our responsibility to understand how codifying stories on stage impacts audiences.
This project also contains my conceptualization for the characters I portrayed in Metamorphoses, my rehearsal journal, and post-show reflections. In these sections, I detail the acting theory behind my characters as well as the steps we took to adapt Metamorphoses for our community.
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Huismans, Anja. ""A just and lively image" - performance in Neo-classic theatre criticism and theory." Thesis, Link to the online version, 2005. http://hdl.handle.net/10019/1756.
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Weiss, Katherine. "Beckett’s Theatre: Revolving and Rewinding Histories." Digital Commons @ East Tennessee State University, 2010. https://dc.etsu.edu/etsu-works/2267.
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LaReau, Brandon. "Dramatic Themes: Active Learning and Thematic Teaching in the Theatre History Classroom." VCU Scholars Compass, 2019. https://scholarscompass.vcu.edu/etd/5755.
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This thesis explores major texts dealing with pedagogical theory and active learning in the context of a theatre history class. By comparing a class which is taught in the traditional, chronological format relying heavily on lectures to a class taught in a newer, thematic format utilizing active learning the thesis defines what student-centered learning means. Active learning, its benefits, and its implementation are explained and explored, along with the advantages and benefits of teaching thematically instead of chronologically. All of this is applied to a theatre history class in the resulting syllabus in chapter three. The syllabus creates a curriculum which uses themes to teach theatre history, while incorporating active learning activities and assignments throughout, to the benefit of the student. Ultimately, student-centered learning and its importance are explained and demonstrated using research, observation, and creation.
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Campbell, Madeleine. "Translating Mohammed Dib : Deleuzean rhizome or Sufi errancy?" Thesis, University of Glasgow, 2014. http://theses.gla.ac.uk/5105/.
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There is a conceptual resonance between the rhizomatic habit in the world of plants and the perennial errancy in the (meta)physical world of man traversed by Mohammed Dib’s writing. In so far as reflective research and the practice of translation can ‘mirror’ the surface of their object, this project is a rhizomatic endeavour. It is a fragmentary journey into the desert, in search of the mysterious at’lāl, the trace of the sign, drawn and effaced and redrawn again by Mohammed Dib to reveal ephemeral truths about the self and its others. Dib’s focus migrates from early realist ‘socio-ethnographic’ novels in the 1950s to metaphysical explorations described by critics as ‘hermetic’, ‘mystical’ or ‘surreal’. The historical and the mystical, however, are two facets of the same inexorable acts of deterritorialization and reterritorialization in a precarious, often oneiric, universe. The ‘visions’ expressed in his poetics are couched in the elemental vocabularies of light and shadow, fire and water, space and duration and draw their substance from Sufi mystical scholars and poets. I posit that Dib’s nomadic contemporary writing arises from the place that lies between the sensible and the intelligible in Sufi mysticism, in a secular transposition of the Sufi Imagination: Dib neither constructs nor deconstructs. Rather, his singular style serves to hone an acutely experiential expression. Further, there is a sense in which each ouvrage is a heterotrope whereby his poetry and prose collections are inextricably embedded in each other, thus one is always in the middle of his universe. The ubiquitous entry point to this universe lies in the middle of his metaphorical desert, an aesthetic landscape stripped of idiocultural signification. Central to its lines of flight is the sign, both ephemeral and enduring, and what is enveloped in the sign is the non-signifying impact of its expression. I argue that Dib’s perennial re-assembling of ‘ces chaînes aux mailles d’acier qui sont mots’ (those chains with links of steel that are words) doesn’t so much ‘give rise to thought’ as ‘give rise to affect’.
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Weiss, Katherine. "Post Show Talkback for Glasgow Theatre Company’s production of Wit." Digital Commons @ East Tennessee State University, 2016. https://dc.etsu.edu/etsu-works/2277.
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Weiss, Katherine. "Archive Fever, Archive Failure: Exploring the ‘It’ in Beckett’s Theatre." Digital Commons @ East Tennessee State University, 2011. https://dc.etsu.edu/etsu-works/2266.
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Dotson, Jessica N. "INTERDISCIPLINARY CONNECTIONS BETWEEN SCIENCE & THEATRE." VCU Scholars Compass, 2015. http://scholarscompass.vcu.edu/etd/3725.
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INTERDISCIPLINARY CONNECTIONS BETWEEN SCIENCE & THEATRE
Jessica Nicole Dotson
A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Fine Arts at Virginia Commonwealth University.
Virginia Commonwealth University, 2015.
Major Director: Dr. Noreen C. Barnes, Director of Graduate Studies, Associate Professor of Theatre
In the 1990s, astronomer Peter Usher was searching for new ways to teach his introductory astronomy class at Pennsylvania State University. He began to engage his students by searching for astronomical connections from other disciplines. His focus was turned to the arts, especially the works of William Shakespeare. Usher found, while searching through the canon of Shakespeare's work, astronomical references that explored the “new astronomy” of the Elizabethan age (Falk 171). This thesis will explore the writings of Usher, in regard to the astronomy of Hamlet, along with the interdisciplinary connections between art and science in and outside the classroom and museum theatre. From interdisciplinary classroom methods, to arts and scientists collaborating together for the betterment of man-kind, the use of theatre is a way of rediscovering the humanity of human history. The collaboration between the disciplines serves as one of theatre's greatest purposes, to educate and represent a living history of man.
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Choate, Catie. "The Action to the Word, The Word to the Action: Teaching Shakespeare as Performance Litearture." VCU Scholars Compass, 2016. http://scholarscompass.vcu.edu/etd/4234.
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This paper details a class taught in the Virginia Commonwealth Theatre Department in Fall of 2015 on the works of William Shakespeare. Within both the class and this paper, I attempted to form the beginnings of a pedagogy of Shakespearean literature that incorporated elements of literary criticism, historical context and performance theory. Dramatic literature, including Shakespeare, is a moving target, as the text is reimagine and reinterpreted on stage again and again. My goal with this paper is to examine both how dramatic literature can be taught and the special challenges present in teaching it using Shakespeare as a case study, and to explore what is particularly meaningful about Shakespeare in the classroom.
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Watson, Ian T. "The Psychology of Theatre and Film: In Theory and Practice." VCU Scholars Compass, 2016. http://scholarscompass.vcu.edu/etd/4202.
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This thesis utilizes theories and ideas from the field of psychology to inform intertextual and interdisciplinary readings that compare and contrast theatre and film texts. In Chapter One, I compare Carlos Fuentes' drama Orchids in the Moonlight to Nicolas Winding Refn's film Bronson in order to investigate the extent each oscillates between Carl Jung's notion of the collective unconscious and Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari's schizoanalytic paradigm. I found that while these vacillating aspects helped illuminate different perspectives of each text, Orchids in the Moonlight more closely represents the collective unconscious, while Bronson more robustly embodies schizoanalysis. In Chapter Two, I examine the magnitude to which the play and film version of Jean Cocteau's Orpheus illuminate his self-portrait. By analyzing the similarity and differences between how Cocteau depicts mirrors and the female personification of Death, I discovered the film version to more profoundly evoke and depict Cocteau's self-portrait. Finally, in Chapter Three, I discuss my process of writing a new play with film elements called Flooded—before providing a sample of the text, and later analyzing the advantages and disadvantages of the film contents in the play.
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Carson, Jo. "Spider Speculations: A Physics and Biophysics of Storytelling." Digital Commons @ East Tennessee State University, 2008. http://amzn.com/1559362839.
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"Jo Carson lays bare her personal investigation into her own creative process after a spider bite on her back begins a series of life-altering events. Spider Speculations applies cutting edge mind-body science, quantum physics and ancient shamanistic techniques to describe how stories work in our bodies and our lives, and what happens when real stories are used in a public way. Carson, whose ability to capture the spoken word hallmarks her community-based work, sets down this story in her own distinctive voice, interspersing the journey with examples of her performance work. This truly original American book will speak to anyone thinking about art and community or engaging with people's stories"--Publisher description.https://dc.etsu.edu/alumni_books/1019/thumbnail.jpg
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Freeman, Grant HS. "A Pact Sealed in Blood: The Creation of Blood Letters: An American Odyssey." VCU Scholars Compass, 2014. http://scholarscompass.vcu.edu/etd/3630.
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A Pact Sealed in Blood: The Creation of Blood Letters: An American Odyssey is a reflection on the project, writing, script and production phases of a student researched and written theatrical script, which debuted in the Shafer Street Playhouse on April 24, 2014 on the campus of Virginia Commonwealth University. This paper looks at the processes involved with the creation of that piece. The theatrical piece tells the tales of three men over the course of 150 years as each man goes through his own personal crucible. The first fights for his country and his family during the American Civil War. The second fights for his country and his love during World War Two. The third works for his country and searches for his family during bouts of political destruction, alcoholism, and lost love. The piece interweaves these three tales with a fourth, present day narrator, in an adaption of Homer’s The Odyssey. This paper looks at the research, development of the script, and the final product of that theatrical piece. It also delves into the author’s beliefs on the search for the human soul within writing and the importance of connection within that search. Finally, it is revealed that perhaps the greatest search lies within our own personal journey.
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Watt, Linda Ann. "One-Third of a Nation, the Second Amendment, a Living Newspaper Play." VCU Scholars Compass, 2018. https://scholarscompass.vcu.edu/etd/5704.
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One-Third of a Nation, the Second Amendment, a Living Newspaper Play
Thesis By Linda Ann Watt for a MFA Degree in Theatre Pedagogy
Documentary theatre, including living newspapers and verbatim theatre, use socio-political commentary at critical moments in history to disseminate facts and offer ideological critique dramatizing the crisis through the lens of emotion, which can incite societal change. This thesis explores this didactic medium with a written play about the second Amendment and gun violence.
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Marcus, Reker Katherine B. ""Can We Do A Happy Musical Next Time?": Navigating Brechtian Tradition and Satirical Comedy Through Hope's Eyes in Urinetown: The Musical." Scholarship @ Claremont, 2016. http://scholarship.claremont.edu/scripps_theses/876.
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This thesis proposes a critical study of the theoretical framework of Urinetown, asking the question of whether or not the show is truly a “Brechtian musical,” utilizing the tenets and beliefs of Bertolt Brecht. Set in a quirky, Gotham-like town where you have “to pay to pee” due to a severe drought, Urinetown follows a cast of absurdist characters as they navigate a society plagued by the perils of big business, ecological devastation, and the inequalities of capitalism. While the show appears to make a relevant social commentary, supporting a righteous rebellion to overthrow the evil Urine Good Company, in the end, by proving that revolution does not always succeed, writers, Kotis and Hollman invalidate these commentaries, proving that despite its Brechtian appearance, the show in its textual form is much more simply a comedic parody. However, Pomona College’s production, in which I played Hope Cladwell, takes on a much more severe tone, creating legitimate commentary by replacing many of the comedic, two-dimensional characters with living breathing, realities. In a text traditionally lacking authenticity, I approached Hope Cladwell with the intention of finding strength and satire in an otherwise vapid character.
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McQuistion, Evin. "A Director's Approach to Annie Baker's The Aliens." Digital Commons @ East Tennessee State University, 2018. https://dc.etsu.edu/honors/473.
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An exploration of Annie Baker's play The Aliens through the perspective of student directing. This includes the process of research, casting, rehearsal, and performance of the play in the Spring of 2017 at East Tennessee State University.
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Simpson, Hope W. "The Invention and Impacts of Hell’s Atmosphere: A Study of the Influence of Sartrean Themes in Two Plays by Alfonso Sastre." Scholarship @ Claremont, 2013. http://scholarship.claremont.edu/scripps_theses/168.
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In this thesis I will discuss the influence of Sartrean themes found in Jean-Paul Sartre’s plays: No Exit (Huis clos), Les Mouches (The Flies), and Dirty Hands (Les Mains sales), on the theater of Alfonso Sastre, particularly in the plays: Death Squad (Escuadra hacia la muerte), and In the Net (En la red). In No Exit, the famous quote “Hell is other people,” sets the standard for what type of discussion Sartre initiates in his theater. I will compare the historical context and the Hells that Sartre and Sastre both experienced during their time as active playwrights and how this influences the Hellish environments the two playwrights create for their characters in each of their plays. Following this study of context, I will compare the diabolical atmospheres created in the plays, how they are created and their impacts on the characters and text.
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Givens, Emma. "A Dull Soldier and a Keen Guest: Stumbling Through The Falstaffiad One Drink at a Time." VCU Scholars Compass, 2017. http://scholarscompass.vcu.edu/etd/4826.
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Theatre history has long interwoven with the production, consumption, and peddling of alcohol. While the seedier aspects of our past generally go unremembered, we can find traces of them in the culture of the times. If we read Shakespeare through the lens of drinking culture, what can we discover about the play and what can that tell us about how to produce his works today? By looking at the rules and customs surrounding alehouses during the English Renaissance I have analyzed the three plays contained within the Falstaffiad (1 Henry IV, 2 Henry IV, and Merry Wives of Windsor).
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Dalsfoist, Kayla. "Monsters From Within and Madness From Without: Manifestations of Identity Fragmentation as a Result of Postcolonialism in Filipino American Theatre." Scholarship @ Claremont, 2013. http://scholarship.claremont.edu/scripps_theses/267.
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This thesis explores the way in which it is possible to undermine dominant colonial power structures through the figure of the organic intellectual. In the context of this work, the figure of the organic intellectual is the Filipino American playwright, who creates characters and worlds that expose the fragmented identities of the postcolonial condition following both Spanish and American occupation. This thesis focuses on Han Ong and Ralph Peña, two Filipino American playwrights who are well suited to the role of instigating change because they embrace the cracks and fissures brought on from years of trying to reconcile disparate identities within an often insecure self and transform those disjointed regions into something beautiful, and above all, worth examining further. By creating works that allow literal embodiment of postcolonial discourse, Filipino American playwrights are able to articulate issues and foster awareness for all involved in the production of the play, whether it be through a performative or spectatorial perspective.
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Montecillo, Victoria. "The Naïve Ingénue, The Plucky Everyman's Hero, and the Ingénue Gone Awry: The Satirical Deconstruction of Theatrical Character Tropes in Urinetown: The Musical." Scholarship @ Claremont, 2016. http://scholarship.claremont.edu/scripps_theses/868.
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This thesis looks to explore Urinetown: The Musical through a critical and theoretical framework, analyzing the show's presentation and deconstruction of theatrical character tropes through musical satire. Using the theories of theatre theorists such as Bertolt Brecht, Peter Brook, and Augusto Boal, this thesis discusses the use of theatre as a device for political and social commentary. Additionally, this thesis focuses more specifically on the show's character of Penelope Pennywise as a new kind of character in the theatre: an "ingénue gone awry," within the context of approaching a performance of the character in a performance of the musical.
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Griffith, Mary Peyton. "Power and Relationships in the Plays of Neil LaBute: Directing and Performing in Some Girl(s)." Scholarship @ Claremont, 2012. http://scholarship.claremont.edu/scripps_theses/112.
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This thesis explores the major works of Neil LaBute's career as a playwright and screenwriter, including the criticism he has received on theatrical and literary levels. The themes most prevalent in the thesis are the use of power and manipulation in the relationships between LaBute's characters and the ongoing maturation of his characters that coincides with the maturation of his work. The second section of the thesis follows the production, directing, and acting in LaBute's play Some Girl(s).
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Taghavie-Moghadam, Mariah. "A Miraculous Deliverance: An Adaptation Through Historical Criticism and Feminist Theory." VCU Scholars Compass, 2019. https://scholarscompass.vcu.edu/etd/5740.
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This thesis attempts to reconstruct the narrative of Anne Greene, a young female servant in 1650 England that was wrongfully found guilty of infanticide and made into a spectacle by her peers as an example of what happens when one breaks societies gender norms and is met by the influence of the gender politics of the period. Her female body was objectified and placed on display by a ritual performance of the hangman’s noose and the criminal corpse to further the process of by maintaining fear among members of the population, especially rebellious women. Thus, making Anne Greene a subversive figure, victimized by a patriarchal society, a trope that remains relevant today. By way of literary adaptation, explorations of bodily practice, and engagements with the historical archive this thesis allows Anne Greene’s disembodied figure to unfold as a narrative and visual tool in history. This study and the accompanying original play text allow Anne Greene to become an essential figure to feminist studies and continuing struggles for equality in the era of the “Me too” social narrative.
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Caldwell, Toebey T. "A PRODUCTION PROCESS FOR DEVELOPING A WEB SERIES, SNAPTV." CSUSB ScholarWorks, 2017. https://scholarworks.lib.csusb.edu/etd/588.
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ABSTRACT
My project for this Interdisciplinary Master’s Program, studying Film Theories and Media Production methods, details “A Production Process for Creating a Web Series, called SNAPtv”. This media production was designed to demonstrate my experience and knowledge I gained through this degree, by specific areas of developing and producing media, including script writing, filming and editing media content, to construct an original web series from Pre-Production to Post-Production.
SNAPtv is a hybrid, sketch comedy, talk show produced as an online web series that mimics the characteristics of a semi-scripted Reality-Television series and combines the elements of a talk show with short comedy scenes used as segues for entertainment.
This original web series SNAPtv, features the lives of four students who move into a co-ed dormitory at Cal State University, San Bernardino (CSUSB). As freshmen students, they embark on a new but similar journey to achieve their academic endeavors while experiencing diversity, social and racial inequalities and situations relevant to those of college students. These issues included, the cost of an education, pressures of studying, time management and adjusting to college life.
This web series will launch from within the CSUSB’s own media channel to produce the first pilot webisode for SNAPtv, titled “MOVING IN”. This project will provide a sample production packet in the form of a manuscript for the development of this web series.
This project will include a completed sample production packet containing the documents necessary to create SNAPtv’s pilot webisode, including essential procedures and functions of The Production Process for developing and producing media.
SNAPtv will demonstrate my current knowledge and understanding of producing media for the Entertainment Industry while outlining my production process for creating SNAPtv
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Hartman, Danielle. "In Pursuit of Women Scientists: Using Science Plays to Promote Women Entering STEM Disciplines." VCU Scholars Compass, 2016. http://scholarscompass.vcu.edu/etd/4091.
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Higher education currently seeks to increase female enrollment in STEM. Women face many challenges attempting to breach this male dominated arena with misconceptions, gender stereotypes, and few female role models. With the recent trend in higher education to encourage more women to enter the STEM disciplines and K-12 schools cutting funding for arts programs, theatre may be losing its value in the education system. The value of interdisciplinary studies is beginning to be forgotten during the grade school years as school boards battle budget cuts, but we can remind society of it through science plays. Theatre artists use other disciplines such as psychology, history, and science to enhance their work, but I argue that theatre can also help promote the needs of other disciplines.
Science plays have become increasingly popular over the last two and a half decades and have done much for theatre. Science plays can assist in addressing the issues facing women attempting to enter STEM disciplines. The majority of science plays feature historical people and can therefore provide the much needed role models and address the other issues and misconceptions. To do this, science plays featuring women should target middle and high school girls as well as their teachers, parents, and guidance counselors who often discourage girls from pursing STEM interests.
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Duggins, Angela. "Thinking Before You Act: A Constructive Logic Approach to Crafting Performance-for- Development Narrative." Digital Commons @ East Tennessee State University, 2017. https://dc.etsu.edu/etd/3342.
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The intent of this thesis was to test the feasibility of constructing performance-for-development narrative using a constructive logic approach. I created an equation which expressed the sum of non-human-elements as the sum of a narrative with each element serving as a variable. I used a review of persuasion literature to provide insight into the selection and manipulation of each variable. I provided my family as a hypothetical example and used my knowledge of their preferences and communication styles in conjunction with the literature and the equation to craft a narrative which might increase pro-school attitudes in other families like my own. I found that there exists a narrative comprised of only non-human elements that are likely to yield change in an audience given a specific situation, and that a constructive logic approach can be used to craft performance-for-development narrative.
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Decker, Ryan M. "Story & Style: Pursuing Excellence on the Academic Stage." ScholarWorks@UNO, 2018. https://scholarworks.uno.edu/td/2518.
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The following thesis is a brief view of the 2017-2018 production of Marco Ramirez’s contemporary play The Royale, as produced by Theatre UNO, the theatre production arm of the University of New Orleans’ Department of Film & Theatre. This thesis will include initial responses, analysis, interpretation, production synthesis and communication, and reflection with conclusions on performance, directing, and pedagogy in academic theatre. This thesis is supported by documentation of the production process, including a scored script. The play was performed in New Orleans, Louisiana at the University of New Orleans Performing Arts Center’s Robert E. Nims Theatre, November 9-19, 2017; the University of New Orleans Performing Arts Center’s Soundstage, February 17, 2018; and in San Angelo, Texas at the Angelo State University’s Auditorium Theater, twice on March 2, 2018, as part of the Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival, Region VI (KCACTF VI).
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Little, Julianna. "“Frailty, thy name is woman”: Depictions of Female Madness." VCU Scholars Compass, 2015. http://scholarscompass.vcu.edu/etd/3709.
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Concepts of mental health and normality cannot be understood apart from cultural norms and values. The most significant of cultural constructions that shape our view of madness is gender. Madness has been perceived for centuries metaphorically and symbolically as a feminine illness and continues to be gendered into the twenty-first century. Works of art and literature and psychiatric medicine influence each other as well as our understanding and perception of mental illness. Throughout history, images of mental illness in women send the message that women are weak, dangerous, and require containment. What are the cultural links between femininity and insanity, and how are they represented? Through the lenses of disciplines such as theatre criticism, feminist theory, and psychiatry, this thesis examines the history of madness as a gendered concept and its depictions in art and literature. Additionally, it will explore the representation of female madness in contemporary dramatic literature as compared to the medical model used during the era in which it was written as well as the social and cultural conditions and expectations of the period. The three plays under consideration are: Long Day’s Journey Into Night, written in 1941 by Eugene O’Neill; Fefu and Her Friends, written in 1977 by Maria Irene Fornés; and
Next to Normal, produced on Broadway in its current form in 2009 and written and scored by Brian Yorkey and Tom Kitts. None of these plays tell a tidy story with a straightforward ending. In none do treatment facilities offer refuge or health professionals offer answers. Struggling characters resort to drug abuse, fall prey to internalization, or leave treatment all together, having been subjected to enough victimization. The relationship between patient and physician is depicted to be, at best, ambivalent. The themes in these plays illuminate women’s mental illness as an extensive problem with many contributing factors, and the origins of which are quite complex.
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韋明月. "當代澳門民眾戲劇先行者 : 周樹利 = The forerunner of contemporary Macau community theatre : Chow Shui Lee." Thesis, University of Macau, 2009. http://umaclib3.umac.mo/record=b2101715.
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Goodall, Harrison M. III. "The Choreopolitics of Liberation and Decolonization." Scholarship @ Claremont, 2016. http://scholarship.claremont.edu/pomona_theses/160.
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This thesis examines dance as a means of social and political revolt in the AIDS epidemic. The course of the AIDS epidemic within the United States was inexorably shaped by the way dancers and choreographers used their art form to rebel against concepts of masculinity, sexuality and disease transmission. Through confronting their audiences with the reality of their loss and humanizing themselves and their loved ones that passed away, dancers were able to change the image of the epidemic and push for necessary political and social reform. This paper also analyzes the ways that norms of masculinity and the stigma of effeminacy in modern society developed, through tracing the development and disappearance of the male dancers on stages across the world. This examination explores the connection between dance and queerness, as well as effeminacy and sexuality, and calls into question the ways in which our bodies and movements are colonized. These were concepts that were all explored during the AIDS epidemic as well as dance and social revolutions through out the earlier part of the 20th century.
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Grantham, Ashley W. "“The Ground On Which I Stand” Healing Queer Trauma through Performance: Crafting a Solo Performance through the investigation of Ritual Poetic Drama within the African Continuum." VCU Scholars Compass, 2019. https://scholarscompass.vcu.edu/etd/5828.
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“The Ground On Which I Stand”
Healing Queer Trauma through Performance:
Crafting a Solo Performance through the investigation of Ritual Poetic Drama within the African Continuum.
By: Ashley W. Grantham
A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Fine Arts in Performance Pedagogy at Virginia Commonwealth University
Virginia Commonwealth University
April 16th, 2019
Thesis Adjudicator: Dr. Tawnya Pettiford-Wates
Committee: Dr. Keith Byron Kirk, Director of Graduate Studies and Karen Kopryanski, Head of Voice and Speech
How does this method of Ritual Poetic Drama within the African Continuum, by extension, solo performance, uncover, heal queer trauma through witnessing and performance practice? How do these methods give us an intersectional approach to talking about race, identity, gender and bridge those divides? How does this devised work of solo performance allow the author as practitioner to claim the ground on which they stand and surrender to their own healing?
This thesis attempts excavation of the foundational theories in regard to performance structure, and to discover how healing trauma through theoretical techniques achieves liberation through their enacted practice. This is an allowance of ourselves as artists and facilitators to claim our traumatic bodies as worthy sites of invention.
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Jamerson, Tommy R. II. "CHOOSE YOUR OWN OZ." ScholarWorks@UNO, 2014. http://scholarworks.uno.edu/td/1926.
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Breedlove, Allegra B. "Hamlet #PRINCEOFDENMARK: Exploring Gender and Technology through a Contemporary Feminist Re-Interpretation Of Hamlet." Scholarship @ Claremont, 2015. http://scholarship.claremont.edu/scripps_theses/667.
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Weiss, Katherine. "Water, Waste, and Words in Beckett’s Plays." Digital Commons @ East Tennessee State University, 2017. https://dc.etsu.edu/etsu-works/2251.
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