CONTEMPORARY THEATRE
TA 127 (3 units)
#17742

SYLLABUS - Spring 2003

FACULTY

Dr. David Kahn
TV-Radio-Film-Theatre
HGH 110;
924-4540
dkahn@email.sjsu.edu
FAX 924-4543
Office Hours:
TR 1:30-3:30

RESOURCES

Course Writing Rubric

Research Guide for Students

SJSU Library Theatre Page

Anna Deavere Smith

Arthur Miller

Politics and the Art of Acting

Mielziner Set Designs

"I Will Marry When I Want"

Ngugi wa Thiongo

Ngugi

Boal's TO

Boal

Waiting for Godot

more to follow. . .

CLASS TIME AND LOCATION -- TR 12:00-1:15; DMH347

REQUIRED TEXTS

Beckett, Waiting for Godot
Brecht, Caucasian Chalk Circle
Kushner, Angeles in America Pt. 1 & 2
Mamet, Glen Garry Glen Ross
Miller, Death of A Salesman
Smith, Twilight, Los Angeles 1992
Thiongo, I Will Marry When I Want
Weiss, Marat/Sade
Additional readings, screenings, theatre performances

COURSE DESCRIPTION

The course begins with the proposition that the theatre of any era attempts to define reality and to affect audience perceptions about the human condition and the world we inhabit. Theatre in the postmodern era mirrors a complicated world: a world of globalization, human liberation movements, high technology, and mass media. Since World War Two, theatre artists have created a variety of responses to the world, affecting both the style and substance of theatrical performance. This course explores major currents of contemporary theatre by examining selected texts and performances of the last fifty years. We will study the contextual realities to which the performances are a response. We will also look at how theatre "takes on" issues and seeks to not only represent but also to change attitudes among audiences.

We will study performances and texts not only as historical documents of their time and mirrors of their worlds, but also as material for contemporary interpretation and production.

Through lectures, reading, viewing performances, discussion, research, and critical response, students will develop analytical skills for assessing the achievements and limitations of contemporary theatre practice. Students will apply those skills by formulating and expressing written, verbal and creative responses to the works studied this semester.

STUDENT RESPONSIBILITIES

This course has a learning curve, if you stay on the curve you will do well. If you fall behind the curve you will do poorly. You can do well by:

• being in class ready to learn;
• paying attention and following directions;
• doing all assignments thoroughly, correctly and ON TIME;
• demonstrating that you are learning something, and that you can do something imaginative with your new knowledge.

EVALUATION ITEMS

Class participation Response Essays Research Paper/Project Final Exam

25% 25% 25% 25%

ASSIGNMENT DESCRIPTION

• Class Participation: Active class participation is expected and you must be present in class to participate. Roll will be taken at each class session and a participation grade assigned. More than two unexcused absences will lower your grade. (Students are required to document excused absences.)

• Response Essays: Five 500-word essay responses on class reading. (guidelines)
  

• Research Paper/Project: 2500 words (A list of possible topics will be provided, or students may suggest alternative topics/project formats. (guidelines)

• Final Examination: Short answer and essay questions on course content.

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SCHEDULE subject to change (rev. 1/20)

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RESPONSE ESSAY WRITING ASSIGNMENT

At the beginning of each class session on which a text is scheduled for discussion and marked with an asterix (*), students must submit a 500-word essay discussing that playtext from one of the following perspectives:

• World of the play;
• Issues;
• Story;
• Character;
• Event Chain;
• Patterns.

(Students must choose one of these perspectives and remain with it for all of the Response Essay writing assignments.)

Each paper must begin with a statement of the play's INTENTION (that is, your interpretation of the "experience" this text produces when it is performed) and then proceed to a discussion of the specific perspective you have chosen.
Papers must be typed, double-spaced, written in academically correct English and in essay form. Citations from the play or critical sources must be notated with author, book/play, and page numbers. The following information must appear in the upper right hand corner: 1) your name; 2) TA/ENG 127; 3) date; 4) play title; 5) perspective (e.g.: "Character").

Due Dates: (only the five highest grades will count)
2/18 - CAUCASIAN CHALK CIRCLE*
2/25 - WAITING FOR GODOT*
3/18 - MARAT/SADE*
4/3 - I WILL MARRY WHEN I WANT*
4/22 - TWILIGHT: LOS ANGELES*
5/6 - ANGELS IN AMERICA pt. 2*

No late or untyped papers will be accepted and missed assignments cannot be made up.

Writing Rubric for 127

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Due 3/13 - Paper /Project Proposal

Each student is responsible for turning in an individual Paper/Project Proposal of 1-2 paragraphs.

Alternatives to a traditional term paper (multimedia, website, performance, etc.) will be considered provided that the assignments listed below are completed as fully as required for a term paper, including a minimum 1000-word summary.

Elements of the proposal should include:

Due 4/10 - Bibliography and Abstract

Using the Library's databases, create a list of at least 10 bibliographic references.

The references should be scholarly in nature, and should look into some aspect of your chosen play/theme. They may offer theoretical, historical, or background information. They can be books, chapters in books, or articles in a journal. In any case, they should come from an academic/scholarly source, i.e., not a mainstream publication, but rather one with its own set of bibliographic references (footnotes or end notes) and often published by a university press or university-sponsored journal.

Please follow a formal bibliography format (eg. MLA) when listing your 10 sources, citing author, article or chapter title, publication title, publisher, date of publication, page numbers.

From your 10 references choose one article or chapter from a book to write a brief abstract--a 2 paragraph summary of the argument and methodology (or approach) and goal (or conclusion) of the article/chapter. Discuss how you plan to use the article/chapter in your research.

Guidelines for Term Paper

The purpose of the term paper is to give you an opportunity to articulate your responses to a particular play from the contemporary theatre. Your paper is a forum for analyzing specific dramatic intentions and discussing how those intentions are achieved by the experience that the play creates in the theatre. You should consider the social, historical, theatrical contexts of the play's creation, and clarify ways that contemporary drama heightens your perception of the modern world.
The assignment is to discuss how a dramatic text serves as a "blueprint" for performance. Define the script's intentions as you see them and discuss how the play's meaning is created by its theatrical elements. In short: how does the play work in the theatre?
Compare the theatrical methods/signifying practices employed by your selected text with other plays we have studies from the contemporary theatre. (Compare means to discuss similarities and differences according to the criteria you choose.)
Your approach is dictated by the following considerations: Your readers are your academic peers who are familiar with the plays. State an interesting and supportable thesis. Give reasons for your assertions. Point to specific elements in the play(s) to support your arguments.
Consider ways that a particular piece of theatre embodies specific attitudes towards problems of the
human condition and uses theatre to heighten an audience's awareness of these problems. A few suggestions for discussion follow. Please suggest your own as well.

• The significance of the play for you and the society in which you live.
• The play's social, political, moral, or aesthetic implications.
• Background and intentions of the playwright.
  
• Influences of, or attitudes towards, contemporary events and/or theatre practice.
  
• Intentions of the play's theatrical devices: characters, issues, events, patterns, world, etc.
  
• Attitudes towards power and authority, class distinctions, social change, justice, morality, history.
  
• Attitudes toward the individual and questions of identity.
  
• Attitudes toward the hero, the heroic ideal, or the nature of heroic action.
  
• Attitudes toward love, relations between the sexes, marriage, sexual identity, family relations.
  
• Attitudes toward the audience, the theatre, the public.

MATTERS OF FORM

1. Papers must be typed, double-spaced, written in academically correct English
   
2. Provide a cover sheet to your paper. In the lower right corner of the sheet list: 1) your name, 2) title of the course, 3) professor's name, and 4) date. In the center of the sheet put an appropriate title for the paper. Titles should be informative and, if possible, interesting.
   
3. Write clear, correct prose. Poor writing will affect the quality of your paper and your grade.
4. Quotations from a play or other published sources should be followed by a footnote indicating 1) author, 2) title, 3) publisher, 4) date of publication, and 5) page number(s). Indent from both margins and single space (block quote) all quotations longer than three lines. Block quotes do not have quotation marks. See standard guides to term paper form (eg: MLA Style Sheet for correct usage.
   
5. Rewrite. First drafts are rarely, almost never, satisfactory. Thoroughly proof-read papers for errors, and make corrections. Be responsible about both the form and content of your paper.
6. Quote or acknowledge sources of information (eg: critical studies of the plays, genre or author; social, political or cultural histories; etc.)
   
7. Attach bibliography

Length 10 typed pages (2500 words).

DUE DATE

Beginning of class May 13.

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