THEA 100 On and Beyond the Stage: Introduction to Theater and Performance Studies
This course introduces students to key discourses and theories in performance and theater studies. Centered on live performance, the course treats performances themselves as our primary “texts.” Students will attend and analyze approximately three to four performances on and off campus, including field trips to see work in Los Angeles.
Through close looking, reading, discussion, and writing, students will develop analytical tools for thinking critically about performance across a range of contexts. We will study artists and scholars who interrogate the intersections between art and life, ritual and theater, and acting and not-acting, engaging with perspectives from across the globe. Each week, we will explore different responses to the question “What is performance?” and examine how theory helps us understand what performance does, how it operates, and why it matters.
This is not an acting class. Instead, students will engage performance through critical analysis, written work, discussion, and praxis-based exercises that illuminate the dynamic relationship between performance theory and practice.
Core Requirements Met
- Fine Arts
- Global Connections