Matching Items (71)
Description
MOVE was a choreographic project that investigated content in conjunction with the creative process. The yearlong collaborative creative process utilized improvisational and compositional experiments to research the movement potential of the human body, as well as movement's ability to be an emotional catalyst. Multiple showings were held to receive feedback from a variety of viewers. Production elements were designed in conjunction with the development of the evening-length dance work. As a result of discussion and research, several process-revealing sections were created to provide clear relationships between pedestrian/daily functional movement and technical movement. Each section within MOVE addressed movement as an emotional catalyst, resulting in a variety of emotional textures. The sections were placed in a non-linear structure in order for the audience to have the space to create their own connections between concepts. Community was developed in rehearsal via touch/weight sharing, and translated to the performance of MOVE via a communal, instinctive approach to the performance of the work. Community was also created between the movers and the audience via the design of the performance space. The production elements all revolved around the human body, and offered different viewpoints into various body parts. The choreographer, designers, and movers all participated in the creation of the production elements, resulting in a clear understanding of MOVE by the entire community involved. The overall creation, presentation, and reflection of MOVE was a view into the choreographer's growth as a dance artist, and her values of people and movement.
ContributorsPeterson, Britta Joy (Author) / Fitzgerald, Mary (Thesis advisor) / Schupp, Karen (Committee member) / Mcneal Hunt, Diane (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2013
Description
This dissertation is a qualitative study based on the experiences of five high schoolers and five college-aged students who grew up in Erie, Pennsylvania, and participated in theatrical productions within their schools, churches, the Erie Playhouse Youtheatre, and other community theatres. The author begins with an introduction of the theatrical scene in Erie and explains the options available to these youth during the times they performed, so the reader will have a better understanding of the background of these young people. The author then explores the current literature dealing with youth participants in a youth theatre setting. In his research, he notes that there were few scholarly books or articles that directly dealt with youth who participate in youth theatre. Most of the books dealt with youth who are part of theatrical programs in school settings, and few researchers utilized the youth's voice as part of the process. The author interviewed ten participants about their theatrical experiences asking them about aspects such as: positive and negative experiences, why they performed, and what they learned from doing theatre. After transcribing the interviews, the author analyzed the participants' responses for values, attitudes, and beliefs about theatre. From this analysis, the author found six themes emerged focusing on: fun, friendship, family, personal growth, commitment to productions, and negative experiences in the theatrical process. Throughout the document, the author utilized the youths' voices and kept their words and thoughts as the basis for all findings constructed and discussed.
ContributorsKosnik, Craig (Author) / Saldana, Johnny (Thesis advisor) / Etheridge Woodson, Stephani (Committee member) / Anderson, Lisa (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2014
Description
This dissertation uses constructivist pedagogy to teach acting via Practical Aesthetics, a system of actor training created in the mid/&ndash1980s; by David Mamet and his college acting students. Primarily taught at the Atlantic Theatre Acting School in New York City, Practical Aesthetics has been the focus of little academic research. The same lack of research regarding constructivist pedagogy exists in academic theatre scholarship. The author takes a step toward rectifying this situation. Using an action research methodology, based on approximately thirteen years of teaching experience, the author suggests that Practical Aesthetics and his accompanying voice and movement exercises can be effective in training novice actors. The author melds theory and practice into the educational approach called Praxis to create specific detailed lesson plans which can be used to implement Practical Aesthetics. These lessons constitute primary research on this topic. Compatible voice and movement exercises are also included to provide a comprehensive semester length digest. The first chapter is an introduction, the second outlines Practical Aesthetics, the third focuses on constructivism, the fourth discusses teaching acting using Constructivist Learning Design, the fifth provides narrative lessons that can be used in the classroom, and the closure provides a review as well as suggestions for further research. An intriguing point made in the closure is a call for studies that might determine Practical Aesthetics' applicability and usability in other fields such as law, business, politics, public speaking, and even non-profit work. Although the primary audience for this dissertation is secondary school and college acting instructors, any scholar studying acting theory or constructivist pedagogy may find value in its contents.
ContributorsDobosiewicz, Troy L. (Author) / Saldana, Johnny (Thesis advisor) / Etheridge Woodson, Stephani (Committee member) / Eckard, Bonnie (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2014
Description
In contemporary U.S. culture, dance is often confined to the young and the trained, isolated on stages and in dance studios, and viewed as entertainment that is disconnected from "real life." Socially engaged dance practices re-connect dance to society in meaningful ways. By connecting individuals to their own bodies, to each other, to ideas, and to social, civic, and educational institutions, socially engaged dance practices use movement, the body, and the tools of participatory art, which contributes to the development of a democratic society, while catalyzing social change, and building healthy communities.
ContributorsJohnson, Elizabeth (Author) / Fitzgerald, Mary (Thesis advisor) / Standley, Eileen (Committee member) / Marshall, Alison (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2013
Description
This document serves as a discussion of and reflection on the collaborative process of rehearsing and performing arrive, create: a Dance made by Many. My intention for the work was to deconstruct the traditional performance paradigm, focusing on constructing a generous performance atmosphere. During the rehearsal process the cast collectively worked to develop an ensemble dynamic for improvisational dance making. The construct of the performance encouraged the audience to engage with the work, both physically and imaginatively through sensory interaction with objects as well as verbal conversation. This document: recalls my background in dance improvisation; explores the relationship of philosophical and dance-making practices; discusses the process of making and performing the work; discusses research data collected from participants; and reflects on the project as a whole. Topics explored include: phenomenological perspectives, ethics of care, "moving identity", dancers' sense of authorship, transparency of dance work, collaboration, dance filmmaking, and dance improvisation in performance.
ContributorsWall-MacLane, Laurel (Author) / Standley, Eileen (Thesis advisor) / Fitzgerald, Mary (Committee member) / Etheridge Woodson, Stephani (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2013
Description
This dissertation employs an ethnographic methodological approach. It explores young people's performance of a New Afrikan subjectivity, their negotiation of a multiple consciousness (American, African-American, New Afrikan and Pan-Afrikan) and the social and cultural implications for rearing children of African descent in the US within a New Afrikan ideology. Young people who are members of the New Afrikan Scouts, attendees of Camp Pumziko and/or students enrolled at Kilombo Academic and Cultural Institute were observed and interviewed. Through interviews young people shared their perceptions and experiences of New Afrikan childhood. The findings of this study discuss the ways in which agency, conformity and the spaces in between are enacted and experienced by New Afrikan children. The findings particularly reveal that in one sense New Afrikan adults aid young people in examining their racial and cultural subjectivity in US America. In another sense New Afrikan adults manipulate young people into performing prescribed roles that are seemingly uncritical of the implications of these performances beyond an adult agenda.
ContributorsSunni-Ali, Asantewa (Author) / Etheridge Woodson, Stephani (Thesis advisor) / Davis, Olga (Committee member) / Saldana, Johnny (Committee member) / Underiner, Tamara (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2014
Description
This six month IRB approved qualitative study was held at Arizona State University to see how a group of seven university dancers' body appreciation and body perception would be affected by introduction and familiarized with Bartenieff Fundamentals and other somatic practices. During this process the individuals gained knowledge about their own bodies through somatic movement activities, journal writings, group discussions, and personal interviews. Movers then used this knowledge to create movement phrases that represented their own personal journeys with body image struggles, doubts, and insecurities. These movement phrases were then linked together in a 40-minute expressive movement piece that represented the journey the group of movers had made and was still making together.
ContributorsRodgers, Patricia (Author) / Jackson, Naomi (Thesis advisor) / Britt, Melissa (Committee member) / Vissicaro, Pegge (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2014
Description
Transformation Is... is an arts practice-led research in Dance and Design, embodying and materializing concepts of structure, leadership and agency and their role in bringing about desired social transformation. My personal experiences as a foreign student interested in transformative experiences gave origin to this arts practice-led research. An auto-ethnographic approach informed by grounded theory methods shaped this creative inquiry in which dance was looked at as data and rehearsals became research fields. Within the context of social choreography, a transformational leadership style was applied to promote agency using improvisational movement scores to shape individual and collective creative explorations. These explorations gave birth to a flexible and transformable dance installation that served as a metaphor for social structure. Transformation revealed itself in this research as a sequence of process and product oriented stages that resulted in a final performance piece in which a site-specific interactive installation was built before the audience's eyes. This work became a metaphor of how individual actions and interactions effect the construction of social reality and how inner-transformation and collaboration are key in the process of designing and building new egalitarian social structures.
ContributorsSibauste Bermudez, Janelle (Author) / Kaplan, Robert (Thesis advisor) / Britt, Melissa (Committee member) / Standley, Eileen (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2014
Description
Guided by Clifford Geertz's notion of culture as symbolic stories people tell themselves about themselves, the purpose of this study is to examine how youth in an urban area of Phoenix, AZ experience collectively creating and performing original documentary theatre. I pay attention to the ways youth participants--also known as artist-researchers--construct, perform, and/or perceive their identities as they practice drama techniques including improvisation, physical theatre, and Theatre of the Oppressed for the purposes of making docutheatre for social justice. First the artist-researchers chose the topics for their play. Next, they learned and applied drama and research skills to gather and examine data sources used to construct a script that explores hiding and exposure. In the process of sharing and gathering true stories our unique docutheatre-making culture was created. This multimodal qualitative research case study draws upon the genres of arts-based research and visual ethnography as primary modes of data collection and interpretation. Narrative description and the ethnodramatic mode of representation are used in conjunction with still images and this study's companion website (www.meant2see.com) to report research findings. Primary data sources include participant observation fieldnotes, over twenty hours of recorded video footage, photographs, and the project's original script and performance of To Be What's Not Meant to See . Further data include journal entries, drawings, and social media. All data were coded using In Vivo and Process Coding methods and analyzed through a cultural studies lens. Codes were sorted into phenomenological categories representative of recurring ideas and themes. Assertions were then solidified once specific key linkages were constructed. This study's key assertions are: Key Assertion 1: Participation in devising documentary social justice theatre influences and affects the construction, perception, and/or performance of urban youth identities through profound connections made with interviewees during the interview process and through the collection of true stories that provide new information and rare opportunities for self-reflection and self-realization; Key Assertion 2: Portions of the roles urban youth play in their identity narratives are disguised or hidden--purposefully, reluctantly, and/or subconsciously--in order to appeal to friends, families, or the codes of dominant culture.
ContributorsGiannone, Enza (Author) / Saldana, Johnny (Thesis advisor) / Etheridge Woodson, Stephani (Committee member) / Margolis, Eric (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2014
Description
"Linked Together" is a choreographic piece inspired by at-risk youth and their ability to learn, grow, and transform their lives through dance. The idea for the piece originated from dance programs implemented with under-resourced populations in Virginia, Panama, and India. My teaching experiences in these places sparked the development of a longer, more comprehensive dance program in Arizona, with a Boys and Girls Club. The Arizona dance program included specific somatics exercises, focused on the integration of mind and body, as well as other types of improvisations, to help the participants learn about movement concepts and develop original movement.
The title "Linked Together" suggests that all people are connected in many ways, regardless of personal differences such as socioeconomic status or language. The dancers included myself, Arizona State University (ASU) dance students, as well as Boys and Girls Club dance program participants. For the concert, all dancers portrayed stories and concepts related to empowerment through emotionally charged movement, and thereby provided audience members with a visceral lens through which to see the transformative powers of dance. The data collected from this project through observations, surveys, and interviews suggest that constructive behaviors that are internalized through dance can flow seamlessly into the non-dance world, encouraging people to think creatively, collaborate with others, gain a sense of ownership, and feel empowered in all parts of life.
The title "Linked Together" suggests that all people are connected in many ways, regardless of personal differences such as socioeconomic status or language. The dancers included myself, Arizona State University (ASU) dance students, as well as Boys and Girls Club dance program participants. For the concert, all dancers portrayed stories and concepts related to empowerment through emotionally charged movement, and thereby provided audience members with a visceral lens through which to see the transformative powers of dance. The data collected from this project through observations, surveys, and interviews suggest that constructive behaviors that are internalized through dance can flow seamlessly into the non-dance world, encouraging people to think creatively, collaborate with others, gain a sense of ownership, and feel empowered in all parts of life.
ContributorsDaniel, Chareka (Author) / Fitzgerald, Mary (Thesis advisor) / Britt, Melissa (Committee member) / Manning, Linda (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2015