| CODE | ACA5031 | ||||||||||||
| TITLE | Historical and Theoretical Perspectives on Social Practice in the Arts | ||||||||||||
| UM LEVEL | 05 - Postgraduate Modular Diploma or Degree Course | ||||||||||||
| MQF LEVEL | 7 | ||||||||||||
| ECTS CREDITS | 5 | ||||||||||||
| DEPARTMENT | Arts, Open Communities and Adult Education | ||||||||||||
| DESCRIPTION | Participatory practices, theories and histories of art, theatre and education will be discussed, emphasising co-productive and site-specific forms of artistic practice as opposed to work that is based on artists' private symbolic worlds. Different lecturers will introduce various aspects and overlaps of social practice, art and performance: the 'pedagogical turn' in contemporary art practice, new genre public art, knowledge exchange, education and social engagement, relational aesthetics, theatre and social intervention, applied theatre, twentieth-century theatre practices, popular theatre, and philosophical and practical implications of the concept of performativity. Study-Unit Aims: The study-unit aims to: (a) introduce students to theories of social practice and historical developments in the fields of theatre and the visual arts; (b) equip students with critical skills in order to analyse the role of art and theatre in social and educational reform; (c) highlight interdisciplinary linkages between collaborative practices in contemporary art and performance; (d) engage students in debates about histories and political contexts of social intervention in art, theatre and education. Learning Outcomes: 1. Knowledge & Understanding: By the end of the study-unit the student will be able to: (a) identify strategies used by artistic practitioners and educators in different social situations and cultural contexts to co-produce politically engaged projects; (b) apply contemporary critical paradigms to the interpretation of historical developments in theatre and visual art; (c) problematise histories of performance, theatre and community practices in the visual arts; (d) problematise the terms 'political theatre' and 'political art'; (e) demonstrate a critical understanding of relations between art, education and visitor interaction. 2. Skills: By the end of the study-unit the student will be able to: (a) develop and articulate independent ideas based on contemporary scholarship; (b) support their creative practice with rigorous research and contextualisation of artistic, theatrical and/or educational strategies; (c) respond to theoretical discourse by applying it to different community and pedagogical contexts. Main Text/s and any supplementary readings: Main Texts: - S. Jackson, Social Works: Performing Art, Supporting Publics (New York and London: Routledge, 2011) - C.Bishop, Artificial Hells: Participatory Art and the Politics of Spectatorship (London and New York: Verso, 2012) - P. Helguera, Education for Socially-Engaged Art (New York: Jorge Pinto Books, 2011) - S. Thorne ed., School: A recent history of self-organised art education (New York: Sternberg Press, 2017) - N. Bourriaud, Relational Aesthetics (France: Les presses du Réel, 1998) - R. Vella, Artist-teachers in Context: International Dialogues (Rotterdam: Sense Publishers) - R. Thomas, ‘Introduction’ in Literacy and Orality in Ancient Greece (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998), pp. 1–14 - G. Ley, ‘The Playing Space’ in The Theatricality of Greek Tragedy: Playing Space and Chorus (Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press, 2007), pp. 1–24 - S. Aquilina, ‘Communal Solidarity and Amateur Theatre in Post-Revolutionary Russia: Theoretical Approaches’, in Redefining Theatre Communities. International perspectives on theatre and communities (Intellect, 2018) - S. Aquilina, ‘Stanislavski and the tactical potential of everyday images’, in Theatre Research International, 38: 3 (2013), pp. 229-39 - M. De Certeau, F. Jameson, Frederic, and C. Lovitt, ‘On The Oppositional Practices of Everyday Life’, Social Text, 3: 3-43 (1980) - K. Rudnitsky, Russian and Soviet Theatre, trans. by Permar, Roxane (London: Thames and Hudson, 1988) - R. Schechner, Chapter 5: Performativity, in Performance Studies: An Introduction, third edition (London: Routledge, 2013) |
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| STUDY-UNIT TYPE | Lecture | ||||||||||||
| METHOD OF ASSESSMENT |
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| LECTURER/S | Frank Camilleri Vicki Ann Cremona Isabelle Gatt Ann Laenen Raphael Vella (Co-ord.) |
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The University makes every effort to ensure that the published Courses Plans, Programmes of Study and Study-Unit information are complete and up-to-date at the time of publication. The University reserves the right to make changes in case errors are detected after publication.
The availability of optional units may be subject to timetabling constraints. Units not attracting a sufficient number of registrations may be withdrawn without notice. It should be noted that all the information in the description above applies to study-units available during the academic year 2023/4. It may be subject to change in subsequent years. |
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