Performing and Media Arts (BA)

About this programme

Performing and Media Arts (PMA) majors acquire a broad understanding of performance and media through several rubrics: history, theory and criticism; creative authorship (i.e. directing for stage or screen, choreography, writing for performance and media); design; and embodied performance (acting, dance, movement). Each rubric entails historical and geographical breadth, encompassing theatre/performance, dance/movement, and cinema/media from every continent and across periods, studying and producing artworks from antiquity to the present. All students benefit from the synergies between the study and practice of dance and movement, of live theatre, and of time-based media works, the writing of plays and screenplays, design and technical realization across art forms, and the critical study of canons and traditions of each form. Additionally, majors practice a range of methods and interpretive strategies, including theories and practices of acting and directing; the study of speech and dialects; design theories and technologies; media platforms and production; and humanities- and arts-based forms of inquiry. Majors are encouraged to locate theatre, performance, movement/dance, cinema and media within allied humanities fields and the applied arts by taking courses in such areas as history, art history, psychology, literature, history of architecture, music, and fine arts. The study of foreign languages is strongly encouraged.