This module is not currently running in 2024 to 2025.
The module provides an introduction into selected contexts, histories, dramaturgies, and contemporary practices of European Theatre. Students will encounter the specific institutional and cultural contexts of creating theatre and performance in a variety of (Continental European) countries and historical periods of European theatre history. The module thereby provides a selective panoramic overview, focussing on practitioners, dramaturgies and current theatre work. Students will also become familiar with prominent contemporary discourses and theoretical perspectives in European theatre and performance studies, such as the paradigms of 'post-dramatic theatre', ‘mise en scène’ and the ‘performative’.
Where possible, the module will draw on current theatre work presented at London, Canterbury, and – for the version of the module delivered at the Paris centre – at Paris, offering direct encounters with a range of different European theatre traditions, genres, and core practitioners, from Regietheater to contemporary dance performance or music theatre. Approximately three joint (compulsory) theatre visits are therefore an integral part of the curriculum.
Contact hours: 50
Private study hours: 250
Total hours: 300
30%, Performance Review (1,500 words)
50%, Research Essay (3,000 words)
20% Seminar Presentation
Delgado, Maria M. and Dan Rebellato, eds, Contemporary European Theatre Directors. Abingdon and New York: Routledge, 2010.
Fischer-Lichte, Erika, The Transformative Power of Performance: A new aesthetics. Abingdon and New York: Routledge, 2008.
Kelleher, Joe, and Nicholas Ridout, eds, Contemporary Theatres in Europe. Abingdon and New York: Routledge, 2006.
Lehmann, Hans-Thies, Postdramatic Theatre. Abingdon and New York: Routledge, 2006.
Maanen, Hans van, Andreas Kotte and Anneli Saro, eds, Global Changes - Local Stages. How Theatre Functions in Smaller European Countries. Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2009.
Wilmer, S.E., ed., National Theatres in a Changing Europe. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008.
See the library reading list for this module (Canterbury)
On successfully completing the module students will be able to:
- analyse, interpret and evaluate theatre texts and theatre performances from a wider European context, possibly including works in languages other than English, from a range of sophisticated perspectives;
- demonstrate their systematic knowledge and critical understanding of the historical emergence and contemporary manifestations of practices, traditions, and paradigms of theatre performance in Europe;
- demonstrate their comprehensive understanding of and sensitivity for the complexities of varying cultural, political, social, and intellectual contexts of European theatre practice;
- understand the wider interdependency of creative practice, critical theory, production processes and cultural policies in the creation of theatre in a variety of national, geographical, political and aesthetic contexts, and the ability to utilise this knowledge for comparative study.
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