In your first year you'll study with our partner, ARU College. This module will provide you with the necessary skills to begin studying at level 4 in courses related to the humanities, social sciences, English, media and education. You will be introduced to the core skills necessary to succeed in higher education, including thinking critically, researching, and referencing appropriately, demonstrating appropriate numeracy and ICT skills, and communicating effectively verbally and in writing. In addition to these fundamental study skills, you'll be given an introduction to a broad range of disciplines whose skills and theories are widely applicable. You will study a variety of writing styles in order to recognise, deconstruct and replicate various forms of persuasive, analytical, and informative writing. You'll learn the basics of intercultural studies and how these theories can be applied to real-world problems. You will consider social perceptions held across Western cultures, and the difference between social and self-perception, participating in structured discussion and argument. You'll be introduced to the core principles of psychology and will explore various current applications of psychological theory. You will also be introduced to ethics and learn about some of the key theories and thinkers in the development of current ethical considerations in a range of scenarios. This module is made up of the following eight constituent elements: Interactive Learning Skills and Communication (ILSC); Information Communication Technology (ICT); Critical Thinking; Intercultural Studies; Psychology; Composition and Style; Ethics; Social Perceptions.
This module will involve you in staging a directed public performance. You will form a company and take on a performance and/or significant backstage role to work alongside your director in the realisation of a contemporary performance text. You will engage in a full rehearsal process, in which you will analyse and explore your chosen text within the context of your wider studies of C20th to contemporary performance and associated theories. Your rehearsal process will involve active participation in the interpreting and staging of your text, requiring you to engage with post dramatic practices such as the adaptation and deconstruction of course materials. This module requires professional discipline, including a willingness to take direction from others and to contribute ideas and work positively towards creative solutions. You will be assessed on the final ensemble performance piece in the moment of live delivery for 70% of your mark. The remaining 30% will reflect your conduct, attendance, contribution and participation in the creative process throughout rehearsals.
View the full module definitionIn this module you will be introduced to the theories and practices of applied theatre. You will study the underlying principles and key skills associated with a range of specialist contexts, such as Prison Theatre, Theatre in Education or Theatre for Social Change. The module will introduce you to a range of pedagogical approaches to facilitating and creating drama, increasing your understanding of the needs and abilities of specific sectors of the community that might be deemed ‘vulnerable’. In-class discussion will develop your awareness of ethical issues related to working in this field and will encourage you to relate theatre practices to wider socio-political contexts. This module will allow you to explore Applied Theatre through practical workshops and the critique of case studies from within the field. You will be taught through workshops that combine seminar discussion with practical drama activities, with opportunities to share your own research and develop your theatre facilitation skills. Formative assessment will be by a workshop plan and rationale, followed by the delivery of a group devised workshop for your peers. The final assessment will allow you to apply facilitation skills developed in class within a clearly defined and familiar context. This will lay a foundation for applying those skills in more specifically defined and challenging employment contexts later in the degree and after graduation in careers such as teaching, arts therapies and community work.
View the full module definitionThis module will introduce the skills that will help you make theatre and performance work at ARU. We will look beyond the rules of conventional dramatic acting and you will be encouraged to think creatively and openly about different modes of performance, as well as how elements of lighting, sound, and scenographic design can contribute to the overall effect. This will include: Performance skills: how to use your body and voice to create effects, how gesture and action create meaning; Devising skills: methods for coming up with original creative ideas for performance, both individually and collaboratively; Design skills: scenographic approaches to using set, costume, props, and digital images to create a performance space; Professional skills: protocols for working safely and effectively in a drama studio or theatre, communication and organisation, giving and receiving feedback; Technical skills: the basics of stage management and how to program and operate our lighting and sound systems, and insights into how these work in industry settings. You will have two sessions per week working in a studio to explore these areas in practice through workshops with specialists in performance and design, giving you the opportunity to gain confidence in performing and performance-making and find the styles and methods that best work for you. This module is designed to be playful and explorative, and you will be able to bring your different skills, abilities, and interests together to develop a common performance vocabulary for devising and collaboration over the course of your degree.
This module will introduce the critical, theoretical, and intellectual skills needed to study theatre and performance at university level. The tools and ideas introduced will give you the foundation to develop as both a student and a performance maker throughout your degree and beyond. You will learn through a mixture of guided seminar discussion and self-directed study, and the material covered here will directly relate to the practical work you do in the studio on your other modules. In the first trimester, we will focus on questions of spectatorship. With your own responses to performances as a starting point, we will consider the roles of audiences, critics, and academics, and explore the theory of semiotics – how the things that the audience sees and hears in a performance are interpreted to create meaning. You will receive support to develop your writing skills, working from writing theatre reviews up to analytic essays. In Trimester 2, you will develop these new skills of critical interpretation and analytic writing by studying some of the social, political, and cultural contexts of performance, looking at key contemporary debates within theatre and performance studies and the wider theatre industry and arts sector. With units on gender, race, and disability, you will continue to explore a broad range of performance styles and to incorporate critical sources from across different academic disciplines and traditions, while also seeing how studying performance can help us understand these complex concepts more clearly. This will equip you to engage with current discussions about performativity, representation, casting, audience interaction, and structures of employment within the industry. Throughout the year, these conversations will be based around many examples of performance, ranging from narrative drama to live art, including access to performance video archives and tickets to see live shows.
The term ‘popular performance’ can apply to a wide range of topics, from mass commercial entertainment, like West End musicals, to traditional community practices, like school nativity plays. On this module you will think about what makes performance ‘popular’, and how the term relates to ideas of entertainment, identity, community, and tradition. You will consider the conflict that can exist between popular performance and elite culture, and how popular performance can be a tool of resistance, subversion, and liberation. Some of the popular performance practices you might look at include stand-up comedy, cabaret, folk dance, pantomime, carnival, drag, religious ritual, pop music, protest, parades, sports ceremonies, and wrestling. You will be encouraged to think about popular performance styles that you identify with and what cultural traditions you belong to. During the term you will work with other students on a group presentation which explores one example of popular performance practice in detail in order to open up some of the broader theoretical questions of the module. By looking at a range of different performance practices, this module will help you to develop your performance abilities beyond conventional acting, especially with how you engage with an audience, and you will have the opportunity to incorporate other skills you have such as dance, singing, and music.
This module offers you the opportunity to perform in, design and produce a large-scale public performance, created from a selected source text. While production work will be led by a tutor, students also must agree effective methods of decision-making, show full commitment to rehearsals and production meetings and demonstrate a willingness to participate in all aspects of work on the production. This module is designed to develop your skills in performance and production work to a high level; there will be a variety of roles on-stage and back-stage for your group to manage and deliver effectively. Collaborative production modules require professional conduct from all students; measurements of such conduct will include reliable attendance, punctual arrival at rehearsals, high levels of concentration within sessions and a willingness to take direction from others. You will liaise closely with professional staff at the theatre venue during intensive technical rehearsals and your own developing professionalism will be tested during this time. For assessment, 70% of the mark will be based on the quality of the live performance and 30% on a consideration of attendance, professional discipline and your creative contribution throughout the production process.
View the full module definitionThis project-based module will give you direct experience of working as a performer and facilitator within the local community. This will increase your awareness of employability contexts, develop your ability to work with and for vulnerable groups, and hone a wide range of transferable skills. Working as an applied theatre company, you will be set a brief to design and deliver a performance project for an outside organisation, such as a local charity, museum, sheltered housing unit, school or health care provider. Practical workshops and seminar style teaching will introduce you to the given context, the ethical and practical challenges related to it, and a range of performance styles and methodologies appropriate to successfully meeting the project brief. You will then engage in a collaborative process to devise and deliver a performance off-site. This module will offer you direct engagement with the local arts community, such as children’s theatre companies at the Junction, primary or secondary schools, or local charities. The preparation of your project will develop your awareness of the ethical, practical and creative issues that must be considered when making performance for specific target audiences and in off-site locations. You will explore the diverse career opportunities within this field, while gaining real-world experience in community theatre.
View the full module definitionThis module will introduce you to a research methodology that treats the live, spatial and embodied nature of performance as a means of generating knowledge and understanding. You'll explore how performance can be designed to test or demonstrate ideas that are not amenable to library research alone, but are practice-led. 'Practice as Research' is a methodology that expands the concept of ‘knowledge derived through doing’ into a research strategy; as such, this module is particularly valuable if you are planning any kind of practical work for your Major Project. Discussion of PAR and more traditional research strategies for the Major Project will be an important aspect of this module. Practice as research will also be useful for all additional performance-based explorations of ideas that you'll encounter at levels 5 and 6. The purpose of this module is to give you strategies that will underpin the research credentials of your future practical work. It will cover both practice-led research and research-led practice. You'll explore how an understanding of ideas can be derived from existing live performance work and how such work can also generate new knowledge. These examples may encompass live art, activist performance, installations and exhibitions, workshops and performance laboratories in acting training. You'll be assessed through your own design of a practical project informed by practice as research principles, which will be performed live, with an introductory (or concluding) rationale for its design, alongside an outline of the ideas with which the performance engages.
View the full module definitionRuskin Modules are designed to prepare our students for a complex, challenging and changing future. These interdisciplinary modules provide the opportunity to further broaden your perspectives, develop your intellectual flexibility and creativity. You will work with others from different disciplines to enable you to reflect critically on the limitations of a single discipline to solve wider societal concerns. You will be supported to create meaningful connections across disciplines to apply new knowledge to tackle complex problems and key challenges. Ruskin Modules are designed to grow your confidence, seek and maximise opportunities to realise your potential to give you a distinctive edge and enhance your success in the workplace.
On this module you'll focus on physical theatre techniques as developed by key practitioners and companies. Figures and topics might include Jacques Lecoq at the International Theatre School in Paris; experiments in dance theatre by Pina Bausch; the plays and performances of Complicité or Steven Berkoff; and the techniques taught by Frantic Assembly. In weekly workshop sessions you'll engage practically with physical methodologies for creating original performative work. These methods may include improvisation exercises, development of mime and gestural languages, experiments with neutral and expressive masks, ‘non-human’ movements, multi-role playing, clowning, chair duets, ‘pedestrian’ dance and the analysis of play-texts for their potential transformation into physical theatre performances. The movement of the body through space, and what this might be made to mean, will be a central concern on this module. This is a deceptively simple proposition, but the development of physical precision, rhythm and disciplined ensemble performance is a labour-intensive task. You'll be expected to be self-critical and able to develop your own physical work towards increasing clarity and complexity. Weekly sessions are collaborative in nature and you must be prepared to play a full part in the exercises undertaken. It is essential to wear suitable clothing to these sessions to enable you to ‘play’, according to Lecoq’s meaning of that term, which includes maintaining discipline in your work. You will be asked to work independently in small groups to devise a physical theatre performance for your assessment. You'll be asked to explain the rationale for your piece in advance of performing it, as based on ideas drawn from key contemporary physical theatre practitioners.
View the full module definitionEntry to this module requires Course Leader approval. Please be aware that the roles available for professional supervision will vary; you must pick a reserve module in case the role you wish to pursue cannot be offered. This module is designed to accommodate specialist training under professional supervision in defined area of theatre production. The type of work undertaken will be driven by the staffing requirements of a particular theatre or studio placement. Indicative areas of work may include developing technical skills in lighting, sound, video or specialist software, stage design, stage management, wardrobe and make-up, theatre management or marketing. You will work under the supervision of professional staff to understand the demands of each role and to gain practical skills specific to your defined aspect of theatre production. This is a module dependent on experiential learning and you must demonstrate a professional attitude to co-operation with the theatre staff under whose supervision you will work. You will be expected to be flexible in adapting to the jobs assigned to you and be willing to work during the particular hours that may be necessary in your role. Your hours will increase during production weeks; you must demonstrate your professionalism as a responsible, reliable and competent member of the production team at this time. You will be assessed by the quality of your work as visible during a performance event. Where your work is less evident during a performance, such as marketing or theatre administration, a portfolio of work covering your role will be presented. This will be followed by an oral examination, where you will be expected to bring critical thinking to bear on the work experience gained.
View the full module definitionThis module will introduce you to the field of contemporary performance theory and practice in relation to Shakespeare. You'll study a range of 20th and 21st century critical and directorial interpretations of plays by Shakespeare in the theatre and on film, exploring issues like power, sexuality, gender, justice, morality, religion and war. You’ll look at how critics, directors and actors generate meanings from Shakespeare's plays, drawing on details from primary texts, secondary criticism and examples of contemporary creative responses to the plays. For your assessment, you'll select a sequence from one of Shakespeare's plays to stage as an ensemble performance, supported by practical workshops. This performance may include interdisciplinary work involving music, song and a variety of performing styles. You'll also attend seminars that will guide the development of your project proposal, and group tutorials to help you set up your group project. In preparation for the ensemble performance, you'll submit a 1,500-word analysis of how your chosen play has been interpreted in contemporary criticism, and examine a range of creative responses to it in the theatre and on film.
View the full module definitionThis module provides an opportunity for you to explore the processes involved in staging short plays and scenes that combine together into a substantial production. This work may include new writing, complete short plays or play extracts. All pieces will demand intensive work in understanding their variety of forms and often experimental nature; the technical aspects of such works can also be exacting. There is therefore an array of roles to be filled on this module, including performers, directors, technicians and stage managers, with each team working to facilitate efficient turn arounds between separate scenes. In new writing, the module may include collaborative work with emergent writers from the Writing and Performance discipline group or industry professionals, such as Menagerie Theatre Company and the Cambridge Junction. At the start of the module, you will study how new plays are commissioned and developed, the relationships between writer, designer, director, cast and audience, and how the written text develops towards staging and publication. Indicative content for this section of the module may include study of or visits to the Royal Court Theatre, the Bush Theatre and Cambridge Junction to see new works staged for the first time or existing works re-staged for a contemporary audience. In the second half of the module, you will form a company to stage a selection of new writing scenes or existing shorts plays. Where this includes scripts supplied by ARU Writing students, there will be opportunities to workshop scripts with the playwrights, with one member of the group acting as director. This module allows you to work intensively and independently in small groups in rehearsal before coming together to produce one show featuring all of the work. Small-group rehearsals will be self-managed, requiring professional discipline and full participation to drive work forward. Management of the whole show will be a substantial responsibility if you choose to take a production role.
View the full module definitionThe individual Major Project will allow you to undertake a substantial piece of individual research, focused on a topic relevant to your specific course. Your topic will be assessed for suitability to ensure sufficient academic challenge and satisfactory supervision by an academic member of staff. The project will require you to identify/formulate problems and issues, conduct research, evaluate information, process data, and critically appraise and present your findings/creative work. You should arrange and attend regular meetings with your project supervisor, to ensure that your project is closely monitored and steered in the right direction.
This module aims to consolidate your skills as theatre makers through the curation, programming, marketing and delivery of a festival of performance. You will synthesise and apply the processes of production explored throughout your degree, collaborating with your peers and staff and taking a high level of responsibility and independence in preparing the work created and shown. At the start of the module, you will reflect on your individual learning journey and career aspirations through the creation of professional portfolio materials to support your input to the festival. This will involve advancing your skills in creating professional CVs, show reels, online profiles and critical reflection of their suitability for your chosen career pathway. You will then identify an appropriate role for yourself as part of the festival team and will take responsibility for associated tasks, including the curation or polishing of existing work and working as an ensemble member in the creation new work for presentation at the festival. This will involve a production process, supervised by a member of staff. In the second period of the module, you will develop, rehearse, design, market and realise a piece of performance, which might be based on a published play text or musical theatre book, an adaptation from other source materials or an original devised piece. These works will form the core of the festival and inform the curation of other events, such as workshops, community performance and/or work presented by other students. The festival will be public facing and designed for an external audience. At this stage, you must show self-discipline, professionalism and full commitment to additional rehearsal and production sessions as the festival approaches.
View the full module definitionOn this module you'll focus on significant developments in contemporary theatre through detailed analysis and exploration of site-specific and immersive practices. You'll be asked to consider place and space as theoretical concepts and explore the influence of performance space on audience reception and on your own creative practices. You'll engage with a range of theoretical perspectives from theatre historians, performance scholars, philosophers and cultural geographers, and with a range of performance practices such as site-specific, promenade, immersive, digital and applied theatre. You'll take part in seminar discussions and reading group sessions, and a number of practice based workshops, off-site visits and theatre trips. These activities will allow you to develop a sophisticated understanding of the contemporary theatre context that you'll be entering after graduation, and working towards the assessment will allow you to imagine your own creative input to that context. You'll be asked to develop and thoroughly research your own idea for a new site-specific or immersive theatre performance. This will be assessed through an oral presentation in which you'll ‘pitch’ your creative idea, demonstrating its originality, thoughtful relationship to place, creative use of space and practical viability. This will allow you to be ambitious and work on a larger budget/scale production than you would usually be able to at this stage in your career. It will also develop a range of highly important transferable skills, such as presenting, budgeting, researching, exploring creative partnerships and fitting your work into the contemporary scene.
View the full module definitionThis module will develop your skills producing short dramatic works adapted for video. The videos produced may form part of your showreel after completing your degree. You will explore the preparation of video material for a variety of new media and accordingly develop basic video production skills. Regular video playback will allow for critical reflection on the work produced and highlight where improvements may be made in performances or choice of shots.
View the full module definitionEntry to this module requires Course Leader approval. Please be aware that the roles available for professional supervision will vary; you must pick a reserve module in case the role you wish to pursue cannot be offered. This module is designed to accommodate specialist training under professional supervision in a defined area of theatre production. The type of work undertaken will be driven by the staffing requirements of the Mumford Theatre, Covent Garden Studio or another regional theatre placement. At level 6, this module will test your skills at an advanced level, with minimal supervision of your role. Your work will often be autonomous, taking a leading role in a production team. Indicative areas of work may be the demonstration of technical skills in lighting, sound, video or specialist software, stage design, stage management, wardrobe and make-up, theatre management or marketing. This is a module dependent on experiential learning and you must demonstrate a professional attitude to co-operation with the theatre staff, tutor and students, some of whom may be under your guidance. You will be expected to be flexible in adapting to the jobs assigned to you and be willing to work during the particular hours that may be necessary in your role. Your hours will increase during production weeks; you must demonstrate your professionalism as a responsible, reliable and expert member of the production team at this time. You will be assessed by the quality of your work as visible during a performance event. Where your work is less evident during a performance, such as marketing or theatre administration, a portfolio of work covering your role will be presented. An oral examination follows, where you will be questioned on the practical experience and knowledge gained during your production role.
View the full module definitionThis module will encourage you to examine and explore teaching and leading participatory workshops in drama and the performing arts. You'll gain practical experience and skills that can be applied as a practicing professional in educational, professional and community contexts. The module will also equip you with theoretical and methodological knowledge relevant to a workshop leader and enable you to practice and develop confidence in delivering effective and well-prepared sessions. Topic areas may include philosophies of education, the sociological and psychological elements of arts pedagogy and the variety of contexts for drama and performing arts workshop education. You'll be expected to reflect on the responsibilities of leadership in creative contexts and develop enhanced skills for future employability. You'll develop skills in independent learning, research and communication of process and product throughout the module. Your assessment will comprise live workshop facilitation, in which you'll lead aspects of a prepared workshop (approximately 15 minutes) and a 1,000-word critical refection that evaluates and contextualises your workshop facilitation. As part of the module, you might be invited to identify a work placement as a workshop facilitator. This can be undertaken either in ‘sandwich’ mode during the semester or in a ‘block’ during the Easter vacation. The nature of your involvement in the placement should contribute to your ongoing reflection as well as your final, assessed workshop facilitation.
View the full module definitionOn this module you'll explore a range of contemporary performance and live art practices that are challenging, often controversial and sometimes disturbing. You'll examine how the body can be explicitly staged in performance art and the ways in which it can be a vehicle for expressing identity positions that are marginalised within dominant western culture. As such, you'll encounter contemporary performance practices that articulate racial, gender, transgender, queer, disabled and refugee identity positions. You'll consider the ethical implications of this practice, its relationship to its audience and its effectiveness as a strategy of resistance to mainstream stereotypes. Content may include the extremism of live art by Franko B, Ron Athey, Kira O’Reilly and Marina Abramovic; activist interventions by Richard Dedemonici and Reverend Billy and the Church of Stop Shopping; representations of race in Brett Bailey’s Exhibit B; queer identities in Split Britches’ Belle Reprieve; transgender performance by Heather Cassils and the representation of disability in dance works by Bill Shannon. In seminars, you'll explore the relationships between performance, the body and identity through a combination of videos, web material, reviews, interviews and critical essays from major theorists in the field. Your assessment will comprise a 3,000-word essay, with advance formative assessment by tutorial appointments to discuss your plans, arguments and case-studies. The practitioners that you'll study may deploy shock-tactics in the delivery of their work - you'll be expected to be intellectually curious, ask questions about this work and be open to new ideas, practices and processes.
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