Undergraduate Courses
E245 World Drama
The purpose of this course is to provide an introduction to some versions of theater around the world in various time periods. It is not a comprehensive survey of world theater, but rather a sampling which will acquaint the student with the study of theater in its cultural contexts. The first half of the course looks at theater from past historical periods and acquaints the student with issues of theater historiography. We will explore how theater reflects the social, political, philosophical, and economic structures of its society. The second half of the course examines some examples of contemporary theater from around the world, and explores issues of intercultural borrowings and appropriations, historical revisioning, and cultural production.
As an approved course in the III-B Arts and Humanities category of the All University Core Curriculum, E 245 fulfills all five of the criteria for the category.
- The course examines one of the four main genres of literature – drama, exploring it in a wide range of cultural contexts, both European and Third World, and in a wide range of historical eras, from antiquity to the present. It will introduce students to many of the basic formal elements of drama and to the interpretive skills needed to understand and appreciate this literary form.
- The course introduces the students to a wide spectrum of social, political, emotional, economic, and gendered issues. Students cannot read these works without learning more about themselves in relation to societies, eras, and cultures seemingly very different from late 20th century middle-class America. The course allows them to explore how other peoples from different times and cultures both treat common human concerns and experiences and present issues and approaches that are unique to their own culture.
- The course trains the student in close reading and communicating his/her analyses through a number of different writing assignments in which the student demonstrates the ability to use the techniques and vocabulary of literary analysis. These two acts – close reading and interpretive skill – are fundamental to critical thinking.
- At the most basic level, the understanding of the attitudes, cultural assumptions, expressive modes, etc. of others is what the reading of literature is all about.
- The course helps students develop skills in reading, writing, critical thinking, and speaking; it also develops their abilities to work both independently and collaboratively.
As an approved course in the III-E Global and Cultural
Awareness category of the All University Core Curriculum,
E 245
engages in the study of particular cultural identities
by looking at several distinct theater and drama traditions
in their historical and cultural specificities: Classical
Greek, Japanese, Chinese, African, and Indian. The course
will explore the interactions among these cultural identities
by looking at some of the ways that later playwrights,
in cross historical and cultural modes, take up and rework
earlier plays. For example students can compare Euripides’s
Bacchae in its original cultural context with Soyinka’s
rewriting of it to explore issues of power and corruption
in post-colonial Africa, as well as the performance piece
A Mouthful of Birds, loosely based on the Bacchae, which
radically questions gender identity. Students will also
explore various forms and modes of cultural interactions
(intercultural borrowings and appropriations, colonization
and post-colonial theory, trans-cultural and intercultural
drama). As students learn about other cultural traditions
and perspectives, they will also become aware of their
own cultural perspectives. The course will expose students
to distinct cultures, and at the same time challenge them
to interrogate what we mean by “culture” and
to question notions of “distinct cultural identities” and “cultural
purity” in our increasingly globalized economy. The
course will also sharpen students’ ability to articulate,
both verbally and in writing, their understandings of cultural
issues, and to refine their skills in critical thinking.
Contact us: Through the mail at 1773 Campus Delivery, 359 Eddy Hall, Ft. Collins, CO 80523-1773. On the phone at (970) 491-6428. By email at english@lamar.colostate.edu.
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