College of Arts and Letters (OER Hub): THEA 1030: Intro to Theatre

In Theatre and Its Other, Elisa Ganser revisits a telling debate on the intertwined natures of dance and dramatic acting; preserved in Abhinavagupta’s eleventh-century commentary on the Nāṭyaśāstra, it reflects complex historical shifts in aesthetic theory and performance practice.

Named a Choice Outstanding Academic Title of the Year 2018The Theatre of Eugene O'Neill offers a new comprehensive overview of O'Neill's career and plays in the context of the American theatre. Organised thematically, it considers his modernist intervention in the theatre, offers readers detailed analysis of the plays, and assesses the recent resurgence in his reputation and new approaches to staging his work. It includes a study of all his major plays--The Emperor Jones, The Hairy Ape, The Iceman Cometh, Long Day's Journey Into Night, A Moon for the Misbegotten and Desire Under the Elms--besides numerous other full length and one act dramas.Eugene O'Neill is generally credited with inventing modern American drama, in a time of cultural ferment and lively artistic and intellectual change. Yet O'Neill's theatrical instincts were always shaped by American stage traditions that were inextricable from his sense of himself and his own national culture. This study shows that his theatrical modernism represents not so much a break from these traditions as a reinvention of their scope and significance in the context of international stage modernism, offering an image of national culture and character that opens new possibilities for the stage while remaining rooted in its past.Kurt Eisen traces O'Neill's modernism throughout the dramatists's work: his attempts to break from the themes, plots, and moral conventions of the traditional melodramatic theatre; his experiments in stagecraft and theme, and their connection to traditional theatre and his European modernist contemporaries; the turn toward direct and indirect self-representation; and his critique of the family and of American 'pipe dreams' and the allure of success. The volume additionally features four contributed essays providing further critical perspectives on O'Neill's work, alongside a chronology of the writer's life and times.

At once both guide book and provocation, this is an indispensable companion for students and practitioners of applied theatre. It addresses all key aspects: principles, origins, politics and aesthetics in a concise and accessible style designed to appeal both to those who have recently discovered this sub-discipline and to experienced practitioners and academics.Part 1 is divided into two chapters. The first introduces the sub-discipline of Theatre for Development, covering its origins, principles and history, and providing an overview of theatre for development in Western contexts as well as in Africa, Asia, the Indian Subcontinent and Latin America. The second focuses upon theoretical and philosophical issues confronting the discipline and its relationship to contemporary politics, as well as considering its future role.Part 2 consists of seven chapters contributed by leading figures and current practitioners from around the world and covering a diverse range of themes, methodologies and aesthetic approaches. One chapter offers a series of case studies concerned with sexual health education and HIV prevention, drawn from practitioners working in Vietnam, Papua New Guinea, Southern Africa, and China. Other chapters include studies of intercultural theatre in the Peruvian Amazon; a programme of applied theatre conducted in schools in Canterbury, New Zealand, following the 2010 earthquake; an attempt to reinvigorate a community theatre group in South Brazil; and an exchange between a Guatemalan arts collective and a Dutch youth theatre company, besides others.

Over seven decades, Theatre Journal has achieved an international reputation as one of the most significant publications of theatre and performance studies today. The journal features scholarly articles that are at the cutting edge of theatre, dance, and performance studies; focusing on historiographical, cultural, and/or theoretical analyses in both national and transnational contexts. Two special issues and two general issues are published each year; all issues include book and performance reviews. The journal also features an online section that includes interviews with artists, think pieces, and other alternative approaches to knowledge production. Theatre Journal is an official publication of the Association for Theatre in Higher Education (ATHE).

American Theatre magazine is the nation’s only general-circulation magazine devoted to theatre. Founded in 1984 by the pioneering arts service organization Theatre Communications Group, the magazine featured cowboy-hatted playwright Sam Shepard on its first cover in April of that year. Since the fall of 2023, it is published quarterly.
American Theatre covers theatrical trends and events, stage artists of every stripe, and economic and legislative developments affecting the arts. Its main purview is America’s wide-ranging network of professional, not-for-profit theatres—commercial, amateur or university theatre is less frequently covered—and the magazine does not review productions (but does review theatre-related books). Important international theatre is regularly featured, and significant productions in the U.S. and abroad are highlighted under such headings as “Critic’s Notebook,” “Currents,” “First Person” and “Global Spotlight.” The complete scripts of major new American plays, accompanied by provocative playwright interviews, appear five times each year.

Contemporary Theatre Review is an international peer-reviewed journal that engages with the crucial issues and innovations in theatre today. Encompassing a wide variety of theatre forms, from new playwrights and devisors to theatres of movement, image and other forms of physical expression, from new acting methods to music theatre, live art and multi-media production work, the journal encourages contributions on physical theatre, opera, dance, design and the increasingly blurred boundaries between the physical and the visual arts.