Doctoral Degrees (Drama)

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Browsing Doctoral Degrees (Drama) by browse.metadata.advisor "Kruger, M. S."

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    Contact improvisation as a foundational learning tool for contemporary performers : singular complexity
    (Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2015-04) Prigge-Pienaar, Samantha; Kruger, M. S.; Hofmeyr, J. H. S.; Sellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept of Drama.
    ENGLISH ABSTRACT: This artistic research dissertation employs the principles and practices of contact improvisation in a literary performative to describe and demonstrate this somatic form’s potential as a complex system of embodied knowing. For strategic and thematic purposes, chapters in this dissertation are referred to as Streams. The First Stream motivates the methodological approaches and emergent strategies employed in the researcher’s simultaneous practices of teaching, researching and writing about contact improvisation. The Second Stream is offered as an oral testimony of the researcher’s attempt to find practical solutions for the increasing complexity apparent in her work environment during the last two decades. It is written primarily as a first-person narrative with references by other somatic and contact improvisation practitioners embedded in the body of the narrative and presented as personal subconscious/collective unconscious interjections. The Third Stream uses a locally-emergent artistic research strategy termed Secondary Primacy to critically and creatively engage with existing literature. The observations of theorists and practitioners from the researcher’s own context (theatre and drama), as well as from a diversity of interrelated disciplines (including psychology, sociology, evolutionary biology, quantum physics, pedagogy and visual art) are presented in an autonomous authorial voice employing the performative strategy of what if. This strategy serves to demonstrate the researcher’s experience of the link between personal subconscious and collective unconscious motivations for action and exposes the transdisciplinary ground upon which many of the ideas and observations voiced in other Streams, in particular about contact improvisation as a complex system of embodied knowing, are implicitly dependent. The Fourth Stream discusses contact improvisation as a complex system foregrounding the particular characteristics of nonlinearity, paradox, emergence and additional capacity introduced in the Second and Third Streams. The Fifth Stream demonstrates convergences and overlaps between contemporary theories about agency, embodiment and transformation as they may apply to educators in tertiary educational performing arts contexts. This discussion is interspersed with accounts of the researcher’s own attempts – through her performing arts educational practice - to understand agency and transformation as workable elements. The Sixth Stream is offered as a personal philosophy of action. The implicit values and strategies of the researcher that were exposed in previous Streams are here distilled and presented as affirmations and Actions motivating the sustained use, by the researcher within her localized educational context, of contact improvisation as a foundational somatic approach for performers. In keeping with the positioning of this dissertation as artistic research, the literary framing devices of a Foreword and Afterword are used to draw a reader’s attention to the practicebased nature of the subject under discussion.
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    Drama-opleiding : ’n ondersoek na die aard, implementering en uitkomste van kurrikula in Suid-Afrikaanse skole
    (Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2012-03) Pretorius, Mareli Hattingh; Kruger, M. S.; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of Drama.
    ENGLISH ABSTRACT: In the past drama education was an uncommon occurrence in South African schools, limited to the elective subject Speech and Drama at secondary level, which was only offered in a few schools in some of the provinces. The assumption is made that the introduction of Arts and Culture as one of the eight learning areas in Curriculum 2005 has greatly impacted on drama education at school level. This study aims to determine the state of affairs with regards to drama education within the current (2011) education system by investigating the nature, implementation and outcomes of drama curricula in South African schools. In the context of the far-reaching changes that has occurred in South African education since 1994, a historical overview of education before 1994 is given to act as a backdrop for a discussion of the process of education reform. The shift to an outcomes-based education approach is investigated by defining and discussing it in relation to the chosen South-African approach; identifying and discussing the theories and philosophies underpinning an outcomes-based approach to education; and looking at the national curriculum from its introduction as Curriculum 2005 until the recent revision of the National Curriculum Statement (Grades R-9), which will be phased into schools from 2012 as the Curriculum and Assessment Policy Statement. A comparative evaluation of the drama curricula in the current (2011) National Curriculum Statement (Grade R-12) and the drama curricula in the revised Curriculum and Assessment Policy Statement serves as the means to determine the nature, content and outcomes of the drama curricula. The Africanisation of the drama curricula is investigated and it becomes apparent that indigenous knowledge, traditions, customs and cultural practices are successfully included in the drama curricula. The comparative evaluation also leads to the conclusion that the revised national curriculum is a definite improvement on the status quo. Through the investigation of the nature and outcomes of the different drama curricula, it is possible to identify specific requirements for the successful implementation of drama curricula. With these requirements in mind possible challenges and/or problem areas with regards to the implementation of drama curricula are determined and discussed. These challenges and/or problem areas are the following: the curriculum itself, the socio-economic circumstances of schools and learners, language issues, the status of drama education at school level, time allocation and management, funding and infrastructure, and teacher training.
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    Ikoon en Medium: die toneelpop, masker en akteurmanipuleerder in Afrika-performances
    (Stellenbosch : University of Stellenbosch, 2007-12) Du Preez, Petrus; Kruger, M. S.; University of Stellenbosch. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of Drama. Centre for Theatre Research.
    This study aims to describe the puppet, mask and actor as icons or mediums in performance in Africa. The types of performances that will be discussed are religious performances, as well as liminal and hybrid performances. It is in the cases where the mask and puppet are used in religious performances, such as rituals, that the iconic characteristics or values are added to the mediumship of the object. In such cases, these objects do not represent concepts/thoughts/persons/spirits; they are these things in the space of the ritual. Matters pertaining to representation and acting are discussed, since iconic representation does not allow for acting from the performer. The actor can function with, or independently, as an icon, while all these performance elements can function as mediums in a performance using acting or role-play. These different concepts are then applied by discussing the term performance. The different elements of a performance and its characteristics – such as the use of time, space, objects, productivity and rule of a performance – are explained. The creation of a performance through the use of restored behaviour as well as the possible results of a performance in the sense of transportation and transformation as temporary or permanent changes in the performers or audience members is then addressed in the discussion. Different performance genres such as rituals and social drama will be used to describe the function of the mask, puppet and actor in liminal and liminoid performances, and to show how these different performance objects function as icons and/or mediums in these genres. Hybrid forms of performance that cannot be classified as purely liminal or liminoid performances are also studied, since these types of performances are often found in contemporary performances in Africa. The production Tall Horse is used to apply performance theory to see how the different performance objects function in changed context in a hybrid performance.
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    Writing the border : avoiding restorative nostalgia by using social media discourses to create a Borderdrama
    (Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2019-12) Albertyn, Maria Adriana; Albertyn, Marina; Du Preez, Petrus; Kruger, M. S.; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of Drama.
    ENGLISH ABSTRACT: A number of plays have been staged about the South African Border War. Some of these plays have been uncritical in their representation of the war and have promoted a kind of restorative nostalgia that glosses over the SADF’s share in a shameful past. In staging the Border War, the playwright has to portray perpetrator trauma in a way that engages the audience to critically examine the past. This study uses the arts-based research framework to create a play that reflects the research done on Border War veterans. The study firstly identifies thematic material in South African plays about the Border War in an overview of the lineage of practice. It then examines social media discourses on the Border war to generate thematic material for the creation of a new play. The drama that was created from this research, is called Bloed en Bodem. Reviews from the performance of this drama at two national arts festivals are primarily used to assess the play as an example of research-led practice. The study’s primary conclusion is that complexity and binary voices can be an antidote to restorative nostalgia. By including voices that both contradict and expose the veteran’s views of the past, the master narrative of conscription is destablized and opportunities for responsible meaning-making emerge.