TDPS Faculty and Alums Win 2024 Helen Hayes Awards
Professor Misha Kachman and alums Frank Labovitz, Alberto Segarra, Kelly Colburn and Dylan Uremovich were recognized for their achievements in DMV theater.
The School of Theatre, Dance, and Performance Studies values the unique power of the performing arts to address social issues through performance practice and research.
We value active discourse, focused discipline, rigorous inquiry and collaborative thinking to creatively express and embrace difference, diversity and identity. We train artist-scholars to be active leaders who influence and expand the practice and social impact of theatre, dance and performance studies.
Employing social science research, this book details how bias affects the brain, perception and decision-making, identifying how these factors manifest in the field of dance. Centering the author’s experience as a researcher, educator and lifelong dancer, it applies social psychology to the events, communities, and teaching strategies in dance classrooms of all sizes and age ranges.
Using critical theory as a framework, chapters define implicit biases and explore the power dynamics that shape interactions on and off the dance floor. Various examples of bias in dance education are examined in detail, as are the ramifications of prejudice and inequity. Finally, the book disseminates the mechanisms that both exacerbate and disrupt the effects of biases, ultimately exploring practiced solutions for addressing bias in the dance classroom. Unique in its narrow focus, this book inspires dance students, teachers, education administrators and arts stakeholders to begin new conversations that will allow dance classrooms to become more welcoming, inclusive spaces.
Associate Professor Crystal Davis was selected for the first cohort of "Breaking the M.O.L.D." Initiative at UMD supported by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. The cohort worked with Psyche Williams-Forson, professor and chair of American studies, Bonnie Thornton Dill, professor in the Harriet Tubman Department of Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies; former dean of the College of Arts and Humanities, faculty leaders-in-residence Marisa Parham and Ruth Enid Zambrana, Distinguished University Professor in The Harriet Tubman Department of Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies.
Read More about Breaking the M.O.L.D. Initiative Inaugural Cohort 2022
The projection designer Jared Mezzocchi has become a go-to guy for ambitious virtual productions. Next up: Starring in his own haunted house play.
The projection designer Jared Mezzocchi has become a go-to guy for ambitious virtual productions. Next up: Starring in his own haunted house play.
Read More about How a Multimedia Whiz Seized Digital Theater’s Big Moment
History and theory faculty Caitlin Marshall co-edited a special issue for the journal Performance Matters entitled "Sound Acts." The issue explores the resonances of sound in the field of performance studies, asking "how the materiality of sound acts as a form of aesthetic and political possibility."
Imagine a future where theatre can show the world how the internet is a living, breathing, site-specific treasure trove of real-time performance.th
PhD student Jordan Ealey was selected to be a 2021 National Humanities Without Walls Predoctoral Fellow.
Assistant Professor Crystal U. Davis received the Executive Director's Award for Service to the National Dance Education Organization (NDEO). The awardee is chosen by the NDEO Executive Director to honor a deserving member who has shown excellent service to the field of dance education and to NDEO.
Read More about NDEO Executive Director's Award for Service 2021
Ph.D. candidate Leticia Ridley publishes a stage review of Round House Theatre’s 2018 production of Gem of the Ocean in the August Wilson Journal.
Read More about Leticia Ridley publishes a stage review in the August Wilson Journal
Ph.D. candidate Fraser Stevens publishes an article, "The Performance of Covert Cultural Landscapes: A Theatre/Archaeology Analysis," in Global Performance Studies.
Read More about Fraser Stevens publishes an article in Global Performance Studies