This programme of study offers you an opportunity to undertake an independent research project. The taught component (10 ECTS) at the beginning of the course will help you acquire the necessary tools to undertake and complete such a project through a discussion of the academic, ethical, political and practical implications of undertaking research in Performing Arts. Much of the research will be considered as independent study, but you will be assigned one or more academics who will tutor the research process, from selecting an area to writing a research proposal, and researching and writing a dissertation. The specific research will depend on your interests as well as staff specialization and strategic research areas earmarked by the department.

The course is intended to give you an opportunity to develop into a mature researcher in a specific area of the Performing Arts. You will be assisted in creating research questions, pursuing and documenting them through an extensive piece of academic writing, and in specific cases, illuminated through artistic practice.

Specialist areas for inclusion include:

Music, Choreography and Collaborative Processes; Practice as Research in Dance and Theatre Performance; Pedagogy and the Performing Arts; the Performing Arts and Cultural Studies; The Theatricality of Musical Performance; Critical Theory and the Performing Arts; Popular Culture in the Performing Arts; Music and Dance in Non-Western Musical Traditions; The Politics of Participation in the Performing Arts; Musicians and Dancers as Actors; Training Practices for Performance; Signs and Meanings in the Performing Arts; Music, Theatre and Dance in Opera; Preservation, Documentation and the Performing Arts; The Dynamics of Collaboration in the Performing Arts; The Performing Arts as Social Texts.