OVERVIEW

Once traditional theater scholars overcame the 18th century prejudice (plays=literature), they were free to focus on performative aspects (“History of the Theater and Spectacle”). Today the need for a new approach is taking shape, one that considers the wide range of theatrical behavior without the presumption of a linear narrative. Its object is as improbable as it is ephemeral but underlies an understanding of the present.

AIMS AND CONTENT

LEARNING OUTCOMES

While not constituting a discipline, the anthropological approach to the study of theater can speak to both its past and present significance by incorporating and even using our inevitable prejudices in the very story of their irreducible historical and geographical discrepancies. This course aims to use contemporary and ancient, Eastern and Western, theatrical and media examples to retrace the main issues of theater and its current state: the body, improvisation, ritual, voice, myth, space, mask and costume, why, when and how theater functions.

AIMS AND LEARNING OUTCOMES

We aim to provide students with the following skills: from a historical perspective, to appreciate the discrepancy (irreducibility?) among theatrical phenomena; from a cultural perspective, to consider the trans-media, multidisciplinary and intercultural traits of theatrical forms; from a critical perspective, to understand the creative, social diversity of theater today from actor’s theater to director’s theater to community theater.

TEACHING METHODS

In-class lectures using audio/visual materials and practical exercises

SYLLABUS/CONTENT

Icarus, Thespis and Solon: three myths of origin, Thebes as CSI (the primal scene), skene and theatron, mimesis and catharsis (and today, Mirror Neurons), theater space as relational space, hypotaxis and parataxis (from the Valenciennes Passion play to the The Last Days of Mankind), masks, poor devils (the birth of Harlequin), in this, the theater ( a dramatic turn of events), Saint Genesius, protect us, theater-workshop (the actor-saint of Jerzy Grotowski), theatrum mundi, (the International School of Theater Anthropology founded by E. Barba), from the Living Theater to reality shows, on the ruins of  teatro all’italiana (Peter Brook).

TEACHERS AND EXAM BOARD

Exam Board

ROBERTO CUPPONE (President)

LIVIA CAVAGLIERI

LESSONS

Class schedule

THEATRICAL ANTHROPOLOGY

EXAMS

EXAM DESCRIPTION

Oral

ASSESSMENT METHODS

The evaluation will be divided into three equal parts: a) learning the content of the required readings, b) the ability to write a critical assessment of them, c) initiative toward personal development

Exam schedule

FURTHER INFORMATION

Please contact the instructor for information on bibliography or other course materials, to resolve any problems getting access to the texts or to request any justified changes to the program.