In Gratitude for the Dream: Theatre and Performance in African Diasporas

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In this course, we will focus on theatre and performance in the African diasporas. This course will discuss some of the different experiences of what it means to be of an African diaspora and to create for performance. How do you express yourself when, structurally, your environment is inhospitable to such a self? We understand that the most commonly expressed histories tend to favor Western perspectives. How, then, do we understand and trust what we learn of the history of Black performance? How do we understand and trust what we hear/read about contemporary Black theatre and performance? What is theatre, and how does that word relate to non-Western traditions of performance? This course will be interested in the connection between ritual and performance, mythology and truth, house and home. It will hold space for oral traditions and modes of performance not necessarily called theatre while also maintaining a weekly practice of reading and discussing published plays, theory, and criticism. THE CURRICULUM 176 History and Histrionics: A Survey of Western Drama