Dramatic Arts

This course introduces and studies Kun Opera singing: voice, articulation, four-tone pattern, musical phrases, breath tone, vocal emotion, rhythm and frustration, etc. It also teaches an understanding and practical learning of Kun Opera body movements, including basic joint flexibility training, basic stage steps and lower body training, cloud hand (circle) training, and basic movements of fans and water sleeves. Finally, the course teaches Kun Opera "Performance," guiding students to understand how to apply the "stylized" basic movements of opera to the "drama" fragments: in the coordination of hand, eye and body steps, body rhythm and rhythm; among them, the use of eyes is the focus of this stage. 

The course allows students the opportunity to explore through embodied engagement a range of methods of movement practices in order to performatively understand place, movement, and cultures. Students study, through practice and seminar, some of the key writings and practices of movement and place in contemporary culture. This can include a range of contemporary and historical approaches to dance, choreography, physical theatre, somatic practice, and contemplative practices.

An introduction to stage design, this course instructs how to collect picture materials; hand-drawn space sketches; basic drawings; make 1:100 rough and color models and visualize text space and design concepts. 

The course focuses on W.B. Yeats as a playwright and as a theorist of the theatre, combining an intensive focus on Yeats’s own work in the first half of the course with a more expansive consideration of the ways in which Yeats provides us with a way of reading subsequent Irish theatre in relation to recent work in the second half. Hence, the course combines the study of Yeats’s theatre and dramaturgy with consideration of recent work in the Irish theatre, including productions of plays currently running at the time of the module. It considers both the work of Yeats, and of more recent dramatists, not only as literary texts, but as performance pieces.

This course is dedicated to better understanding the evolution of theatrical art in Europe from antiquity to the 20th century. It considers performance spaces characterized by their architecture, their place in the city, and their function in society to understand the possible history of the “places of theater.” The course starts by examining the origins of theater in ancient Greek and Roman society, followed by medieval theater and theater of the Italian, English, and Spanish Renaissance. It then studies French theater from the 17th century to the 19th century and finally, takes a look at European theater up to the 20th century.

This is a special studies course involving an internship with a corporate, public, governmental, or private organization, arranged with the Study Center Director or Liaison Officer. Specific internships vary each term and are described on a special study project form for each student. A substantial paper or series of reports is required. Units vary depending on the contact hours and method of assessment. The internship may be taken during one or more terms but the units cannot exceed a total of 12.0 for the year.

This course aims to develop students' English language skills at an advanced level via reading, performing, and writing about various types of drama. Students will read and perform selections ranging from comedy through tragedy to a contemporary play to examine the differences between the English language in drama and English language in other types of written text.

In this course, students will learn about the manifestos of selected dramatic authors in order to understand the relationship between the author's intentionality and his work, and generate reflection on their own creative inquiries.

This is an independent research course with research arranged between the student and faculty member. The specific research topics vary each term and are described on a special project form for each student. A substantial paper is required. The number of units varies with the student’s project, contact hours, and method of assessment, as defined on the student’s special study project form.

This course introduces some fundamental styles and plays from European avant-garde theatre and sets them within an artistic and socio-political context. Futurism, Dada, Expressionism and the Theatre of the Absurd are included. Special attention is paid to Spanish and Catalan drama.