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MA Performance & Culture: Interdisciplinary Perspectives

MA Performance & Culture: Interdisciplinary Perspectives

Different course options

Full time | Goldsmiths, University of London | 1 year | 23-SEP-24

Study mode

Full time

Duration

1 year

Start date

23-SEP-24

Key information
DATA SOURCE : IDP Connect

Qualification type

MA - Master of Arts

Subject areas

Cultural Studies Performing Arts (General)

Course type

Taught

Course Summary

This interdisciplinary Masters programme invites you to interrogate the different ways in which performance can be said to be a socio-cultural phenomenon. It draws on a wide range of theoretical perspectives to understand how performance is shaped by the culture from which it emerges and how it shapes that culture.

Why study MA Performance and Culture at Goldsmiths?

  • Examine diverse performance forms from across the globe, including practices such as: dance and movement-based performance; ritual practices; performance art; text-based theatre; protest performance; site-specific performance; installation art
  • Engage with a wide range of theoretical frameworks, using principles and methodologies from sociology, cultural theory, performance studies, anthropology, history, philosophy, and political science to explore performance as a sociocultural process.
  • Develop your critical thinking, oral, and written presentation skills, as well as your ability to manage independent research projects.
  • Tackle fundamental questions about culture and society from contemporary and historical perspectives, including: How can performance respond to, disrupt, or challenge sociopolitical processes? What does it mean to perform and embody one’s culture? What is the role of culturally specific performance in a globalized world?
  • Become a member of a rich, vibrant, and international research community within a politically active university that has links, locally and internationally, with a wide variety of theatres, companies, performers, and arts institutions, all of which enhance your research possibilities.

Skills

You will develop writing and oral skills at a high academic level, demonstrating the ability to think and work in an interdisciplinary manner using a range of methodologies. your ability to work collaboratively and to facilitate and participate in group discussions will be enhanced.

You will also develop skills in identifying the socio-cultural, historical and political issues and pressures specific to varied types of performance.

Careers

The MA Performance and Culture will provide you with a strong grounding in the principles of research and of learning through independent research. It is particularly suitable if you wish to pursue further academic work in creative, performative fields, with many previous graduates going on to undertake PhD study.

Other graduates have embarked on professional careers as artists and/or working with performance companies, theatre festivals, arts organisations, NGOs, as well as in the fields of education, cultural policy and journalism. Our alumni base is truly global, with previous students currently working in Singapore, the United States, Sri Lanka, Chile, Taiwan, Trinidad and Tobago, Hong Kong, Canada, Romania, among other countries.

Modules

This module focuses on a selected number of fundamental concepts, categories of thought and methodological issues and problems pertinent to cultural theory and its relation to performance. The module is based on the premise that performance activity, however defined for specific purposes, is a social and cultural practice. As such, performance is to be analysed, understood, explained and questioned in terms commensurate with its complexity. These terms are provided by interdisciplinary work, which, in this course, will draw, notably, on theatre and performance studies, the sociology of culture, sociology, anthropology, ethnography, political science, philosophy, aesthetics, and theories of signs and of artistic genres. Although the module is primarily theoretical, it assumes that theory is dialogically interrelated with the practice of practitioners. It thus uses the latter to explore and develop points of theory; and uses theory to foreground aspects of theatre and performance practice. Apart from the inclusion of contemporary practitioners in the module structure, as indicated below, students will be expected to engage with performances available to them in London and elsewhere during their studies, and discuss them in the seminar, as appropriate.
Dissertation

Tuition fees

UK fees
Course fees for UK students

For this course (per year)

£9,630

International fees
Course fees for EU and international students

For this course (per year)

£20,460

Entry requirements

Students should have (or expect to be awarded) an undergraduate degree of at least upper second class standard in a relevant/related subject. Students might also be considered for some programmes if they aren’t a graduate or their degree is in an unrelated field, but have relevant experience and can show that students have the ability to work at postgraduate level.