Why study MA
Applied Theatre at York St John University?
- Your own practice is at the centre of the
programme - A central focus is your own individual
practice, with specialist modules providing the opportunity to
develop new skills and techniques in different locations and
contexts.
- Establish a professional profile - This
programme will offer you the chance to develop your professional
profile within the growing field of applied theatre activity,
building on your existing skills and knowledge.
- Engage with applied and community based
projects - Central to the programme are workshop and
project opportunities with established partners and locations in
the wider community.
- Work with people who use mental health services
- The Faculty of Arts has established a formal
relationship with local mental health services. An Education
Support Worker employed by the NHS works with students to offer
theatre opportunities to people who use mental health services.
Students on the MA in Applied Theatre will have the
opportunity to run courses and workshops for mental health service
users. They may also be involved in supporting Out of
Character, a theatre company comprising service users and
students. More
info... or watch a documentary of their production at The
York Theatre Royal.
- Make exciting work and develop creative
approaches - As part of York St John University’s Creative
Practice hub, this MA programme shares some of its modules with
companion MA awards in Music Composition, Theatre
and Performance and Fine Arts. This offers exciting
cross-disciplinary opportunities to develop creative skills.
- Study at a centre of expertise - Applied and
community practice at York St John University is well established
across a range of art forms. Experienced lecturers have expertise
and research activity in the fields of health, youth, education and
community contexts.
What will
I study?
The programme is designed to focus on developing
your abilities and capacities for professional, vocational and
academic innovation. We emphasise relationships between practice
and theory, reflection and documentation. This degree is structured
to enable candidates who already have some experience of theatre,
drama and performance practice to expand their artistic horizons,
encounter related knowledge and discourses and develop specific
skills in applied theatre.
You will follow two strands of modules
through the programme:
Reflective Practice
This element of the MA award consists of two 40
credit modules, which are discipline specific modules particular to
MA Applied Theatre. These modules will be primarily focused around
students’ own practice, contextualised by examination of various
key practitioners, modes or epistemologies.
The first of these modules, Applied Theatre
Practice, invites students to interrogate the processes – from
conception and implementation to evaluation and analysis – employed
in applied theatre practice. Students will be invited to critically
consider and evaluate a range of methodological strategies of
making, thinking and doing as utilised in applied theatre practice.
Emphasis will be placed on reflexive approaches to practice in
order to heighten students’ appreciation of the impact of their
work. Accordingly the political, ethical and aesthetic dimensions
of applied theatre work will be foregrounded so that students
deepen their awareness of the contexts in which their work takes
place and the implications of the choices made in their own
practice.
The second module in this element, Critical
Concepts in Applied Theatre, provides students with the opportunity
to critically explore, test and model approaches to applied and
community arts practice. Students will engage in the claims made
for the ‘efficacy’ of applied theatre practices seeking to
understand their underlying assumptions. The focus will be on the
exploration of how the concepts and rationales at play in applied
and community practice manifest themselves in the ethics, impacts
and aesthetics of applied practice. This module will provide
students with the opportunity to engage with conceptual and
theoretical issues relating to applied theatre at an advanced
level.
Creativity & Knowledge
This strand, consisting of two 20 credit modules,
is designed to deepen students’ understanding of key
interdisciplinary questions, concepts and methodologies in the
arts.
Creativity and Knowledge 1 invites students to
interrogate a range of key themes relating to the relationship
between art and the wider cultural, social, economic circumstances
of its production and reception. Creativity and Knowledge 2
consists of investigation into concepts of practice-based research
in the arts and the examination of the epistemological and
ideological implications of the widening of traditional concepts of
research that such developments entail.
This strand of modules is taught
cross-disciplinarily with students on the MA programmes within
Creative Practice.
Masters Independent Project
Together these taught elements lead into the
final Independent Project module, where MA students undertake an
extended period of supervised practice-based research.
Attendance
The programme is offered in the following modes
of study:
- Full-time: One year
- Part-time: Two years
The programme begins in September each year. The
taught modules will normally consist of weekly sessions scheduled
on one day a week. There may also be the occasional intensive
weekend sessions.
Awards
Students would normally enrol onto the MA
programme (180 credits). However there is the possibility of
undertaking the Postgraduate Diploma (consisting of 120 credits of
taught modules but not the Independent Project) or exiting with the
Postgraduate Certificate (60 credits).
These routes may be attractive if you wish to
update or consolidate your existing qualifications but do not wish
to carry out extended research into applied theatre practice.
Degree programme information
Programme specifications
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