Unit name | Popular Performance |
---|---|
Unit code | THTR20018 |
Credit points | 20 |
Level of study | I/5 |
Teaching block(s) |
Teaching Block 1 (weeks 1 - 12) |
Unit director | Dr. Krebs |
Open unit status | Not open |
Pre-requisites |
None |
Co-requisites |
None |
School/department | Department of Theatre |
Faculty | Faculty of Arts |
This unit explores the history, development and legacy of popular performance. At once synonymous with a ‘low brow’ entertainment of the masses and often pitted against ‘legitimate theatre,’ the diverse range of popular performance media and venues offer an insightful reflection of social concerns through a celebration of the culture and spectacle of the moment. By exploring these less academically considered and less familiar performances, this unit allows students to explore new perspectives on performance in relation to social and political change and development in the ‘Arts’, and provides a fascinating and varied way of understanding performance history. Depending on staff research interests and expertise, forms studied might include cabaret, music hall, revue, musical theatre, theme parks, stand-up comedy and contemporary popular music and students will have the opportunity to pursue research into other popular performances of interest in their final essay. Students will be prompted to consider the relationship between popular performance and a range of issues, such as: commercialism, industrialisation, urbanisation, authenticity, race, gender and sexuality. The unit will take an international perspective, looking at venues and performances in a range of locations, which might include London, Paris, Berlin, Zurich and New York.
The unit aims:
1. To explore critically a range of less considered and less familiar performance practices.
2. To develop appropriate critical and theoretical approaches to the chosen practices.
3. To encourage critical understandings of the socio-cultural contexts of a range of performance practices.
4. To engage in research-based investigation of appropriate primary and secondary material.
On successful completion of this unit students will be able to:
Teaching will be delivered through a combination of synchronous and asynchronous webinars, narrated powerpoints, on-line discussion boards and self-directed reading.
(1) 2500-word essay (60%)
(2) Individual 5-7 minute digital presentation (40%)
Appigenesi, Lisa, Cabaret (London, 1975)
Harris, Geraldine (1989) ‘But is it Art? Female Performers in the Café-Concert’, New Theatre Quarterly, 334-47
Henderson, J.A. (1971) The First Avant-Garde 1887-1894: Sources of the Modern French Theatre. London: Harrap
Oberthur, Mariel (1984) Cafes and Cabarets of Montmartre. Salt Lake City: Gibbs M Smith
Segal, Harold, B. (1987) Turn-of-the-Century Cabaret. New York: Columbia University Press
Current, Richard Nelson and Marcia Ewing Current, Loie Fuller: Goddess of Light (Austin, Texas, 1997)