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Articles 1 - 12 of 12

Full-Text Articles in Playwriting

Sweat Equity: Lynn Nottage's Radical Dialectic Of Deindustrialization, Jocelyn L. Buckner May 2023

Sweat Equity: Lynn Nottage's Radical Dialectic Of Deindustrialization, Jocelyn L. Buckner

Theatre Faculty Books and Book Chapters

"Lynn Nottage has devoted her career to researching and telling stories of Black individuals and communities with expressed interest in laborers, advocating for their agency, humanity, and legacy. In her second Pulitzer Prize-winning play, Sweat, Nottage dramatizes more recent US history, illuminating the lives of workers marginalized by the deindustrialization of the Rust Belt in the early 2000s. Sweat is emblematic of Nottage's sustained effort to deploy playwriting as activism and stand in solidarity with those whose stories she chooses to tell. As a constant theme in her works, Lynn Nottage's stories align with marginalized workers' efforts and histories, …


Black Expressions Of Dillard University: How One Historically Black College Pioneered African American Arts, Makenzee Brown May 2020

Black Expressions Of Dillard University: How One Historically Black College Pioneered African American Arts, Makenzee Brown

University of New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

The proposed public history project, Within These Walls (WTW), will be one component of a larger exhibit produced by Dillard University’s, Library Archives and Special Collections entitled The Star Burns Bright: History of Dillard’s Theatrical and Musical Arts, Faculty and Students. WTW will focus on Dillard’s historic African American faculty, students and alumni who became prominent painters, musicians, writers, actors and directors among them Adella Gautier, Randolph Edmonds, Ted Shine Frederick Hall, Theodore Gilliam, and Brenda Osbey. This exhibit will also highlight the many art programs, across genres, offered at the university between 1935 and 1970. This exhibit will demonstrate …


An Actor's Process In Bridging The Gap Between First-Generation And Multi-Generational African-American Identities., Mutiyat Ade-Salu May 2020

An Actor's Process In Bridging The Gap Between First-Generation And Multi-Generational African-American Identities., Mutiyat Ade-Salu

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis reflects my process assimilating into the role of Chelle in the production of Detroit '67 at the University of Louisville. Although there have been instances of actors crossing lines of gender, nationality, race, and even sexuality, to perform roles in contemporary theatre, discussion about generational differences is almost non-existent. Through historical research, first-hand interviews, and conventional acting methods, I explore the world of my role, searching for spirituality, authenticity, and identity. Additionally, I explain my use of The WAY Method ®, a process I began creating in 2014 to help actors be clear with who they are before …


Dmt And “The Man Box:” Provoking Change And Encouraging Authentic Living, An Arts-Based Project, Steven Reynolds May 2019

Dmt And “The Man Box:” Provoking Change And Encouraging Authentic Living, An Arts-Based Project, Steven Reynolds

Expressive Therapies Capstone Theses

This thesis explores the mind-body experience through an arts-based research approach to examine, and redefine the emotional capacity and usefulness of males through societal determinants that limits and hinders men from living their authentic selves. Through the lens of a metaphoric “Man Box” 112 men participated in a workshop recreating their personal narratives of socialization through, style of dress, coping mechanisms, belief systems and who they should be as men through society's standards. In the “Man Box,” male bonding, and emotional feelings are discouraged, while the objectification of women, material property and physical/emotional strength are encouraged. This research investigates the …


Defending Eulalie, Mimi Ayers Dec 2018

Defending Eulalie, Mimi Ayers

University of New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

No abstract provided.


The Creation And Development Of Rise, Paul Randall Mcinnis May 2018

The Creation And Development Of Rise, Paul Randall Mcinnis

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In “The Creation and Development of Rise”, I will explain how my play evolved from the initial writing process until the actual production of the show. The Department of Theatre allows students to experience the development of new work through the functions of the classroom. The goal is to simulate how a process would occur in the professional world. The purpose of this thesis is to explore the journey of creation within Rise. Rise tells the story of the community of St. Marie, Louisiana during Mardi Gras, 1972. The play highlights the city’s triumphs and downfalls, and it is set …


Radical Black Drama-As-Theory: The Black Feminist Dramatic On The Protracted Event-Horizon, Jaye Austin Williams Jan 2018

Radical Black Drama-As-Theory: The Black Feminist Dramatic On The Protracted Event-Horizon, Jaye Austin Williams

Faculty Journal Articles

In this essay, I elaborate my present project, grounded in what I call drama theory, the critical theoretical dimensions of dramatic writing, and address the deeply troubling intramural tensions across Black Studies, between those who read blackness, and black cultural production, through largely futurist, celebratory lenses; and those who apply a structural analysis to blackness as the site against, upon, and through which the world coheres its soci(et)al apparatuses and machinations. I situate myself within the latter constellation, and sample here two plays by Suzan-Lori Parks to demonstrate how I translate the analyses of antiblack violence by black feminist …


Carol And The Ugly Sisters: A Play In Three Acts, Judith Jones Dec 2017

Carol And The Ugly Sisters: A Play In Three Acts, Judith Jones

Master of Arts in Professional Writing Capstones

Carol and the Ugly Sisters, reflects the trajectory of two teenage African American girls growing up in 1960s Harlem. They met when Anita was 16, and Carol was 17. Anita, the protagonist, is from a lower middle-class family, and goes on to graduate Columbia University. Carol, her friend, dropped out of middle school, and is an unwed mother of three children, when she meets Anita. She remains mentally closed in a lower socio-economic mindset for the remainder of her life, and dies of the same alcoholism that killed her parents.


Revolutionary Every Day: A Dramatic Exploration Of Women And Their Agency In The Black Panther Party., Kristen Michelle Walker May 2017

Revolutionary Every Day: A Dramatic Exploration Of Women And Their Agency In The Black Panther Party., Kristen Michelle Walker

Master of Arts in American Studies Capstones

This capstone project is centered around Black Panther women and explores what it means to be a revolutionary black woman dealing with politics surrounding gender in both private and public spaces during the late 1960’s and beyond. In addition, the project includes an original fictional play based on the experiences of Panther women around the world. In addressing the social conditions that impacted female Panther activism and agency, together the capstone project and play operate as a commentary on power, gender relations, and society in and around the Black Panther Party.


Staging Colorism, Mya D. Flood Jul 2016

Staging Colorism, Mya D. Flood

Theater Summer Fellows

Colorism is a topic not frequently discussed in the African American community. My research focuses on representations of colorism in American drama. Using this research, I am workshopping a creative performance piece about this taboo topic to educate both Ursinus students and community members of all racial backgrounds. The research involves dissecting plays that confront colorism and the everyday struggles dealing with the stereotypes that come along with lighter and darker skin. My research takes the form of an annotated bibliography of plays about colorism and/or racism, a 20 page research paper about colorism in drama, and a draft of …


Opening Remarks To Outing Lorraine At The Schomburg Center, Shawn(Ta) Smith-Cruz May 2014

Opening Remarks To Outing Lorraine At The Schomburg Center, Shawn(Ta) Smith-Cruz

Publications and Research

This article is an edit of the opening remarks for the event held on May 22nd, 2014 at the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture as part of the In The Life Series supplying Black LGBT programming coordinated by Steven Fullwood. Outing Lorraine included panelists: Alexis DeVeaux, Joi Gresham, and Steven Fullwood and was moderated by Shawn(ta) Smith-Cruz. Opening remarks provide a biographical description of Lorraine Hansberry's life, prepare the audience for a conversation on the implications for "outing" a black iconic figure, details the purpose for use of primary and secondary sources when, and provides a bibliography for …


Ua37/23 Whas Broadcast No. 24, Whas, Western Kentucky University, Earl Moore Mar 1936

Ua37/23 Whas Broadcast No. 24, Whas, Western Kentucky University, Earl Moore

WKU Archives Records

Script for weekly WKU broadcast on WHAS radio. This particular show is a play written using letters owned by Lenora Lindley of Livermore, Kentucky written by a freed slave in Liberia to her former owner in Ohio County, Kentucky.