This course offers a continuing introduction to the history and development of world theater and drama. We will experience the vibrant pageant of theater history through an exploration of its conventions and aesthetics, as well as its social and cultural functions. Starting in the nineteenth century, we will read representative plays ranging from the advent of stage Realism and Naturalism with Ibsen and Strindberg, through modern and contemporary drama (from the United States, Europe, Asia, South America, and Africa). As we study theatrical movements including Symbolism, Expressionism, Epic Theater, and Theater of the Absurd, we will also read key critical and theoretical texts illuminating the plays. Looking at theater history as “living theater,” the course encompasses not only the study of plays as dramatic texts, but also their contexts of theater architecture and stagecraft, performance conventions, debates of art and commerce, shifting relationships to the audience, and questions about expanding the canon. Through an interdisciplinary study of theater history, students will also learn to connect theatrical traditions and conventions to contemporary practices in diverse forms and cultures.
Learning Outcomes:
Students will:
o Become familiar with key figures, innovations, concepts, and conventions of world theater history, from the late nineteenth century, with the advent of Realism, through the turn of the twenty-first century.
o Understand the diverse functions that theater has served, within its various historical, political, aesthetic, and cultural contexts.
o Learn to analyze dramatic literature through perspectives informed by global theater history.
o Connect theater history and dramatic literature, with the dramatic theories informing its contexts, development, and reception.
Delivery Method: Fully in-person
Course Level: 2000-level
Credits: 4
M/Th 10:00AM - 11:50AM (Full-term)
Maximum Enrollment: 20
Course Frequency: Once a year
Categories: 2000 , All courses , Drama , Four Credit , Fully In-Person
Tags: analyzing , drama , dramatic literature , reading , theater history , writing