The Purpose of Drama

Through drama you can become anyone, anywhere, at anytime. By understanding drama you can learn to understand anyone, anywhere anytime. Plays often capture the essence of a culture or a group within that culture. They reveal the attitudes and opinions of their day.

 

Improvisation

Drama gives us the opportunity to hone our Improvisation skills. Improvisation is the spontaneous response to new and unexpected situations. Life is improvisation. We respond in new ways when spontaneous and unexpected things occur to us.

Play making

In Drama you will be expected to create plays. No prior knowledge of Play making is expected at ACU but all students are expected to participate whether that be on stage or in backstage work. Play making is the process of experimenting with new roles. Through plays we can re-examine old roles and challenge society’s values and interpretations.

Drama As A Co-operative Process

In Drama you will be asked to participate in group work. This will help you to explore relationships on and off stage. It will help your communication skills and it will help you to make friends on campus.

Personal Benefits

Studying Drama has a lot of personal benefits for students. It helps with building self-confidence, speaking in public, and developing interpersonal skills. Drama will help you to be more aware of how your physical presentation can effect the way people see you. Ethically, it provides the motivation to start to evaluate your own values and beliefs.

Drama Influences our Lives

Drama plays a major role in our lives. We all experience 'real life’ drama in the form of our own personal experiences as well as ‘real life’ drama in the news and current affairs. We are also exposed to fictional drama in film, on television, and in the theatre. By studying drama’s impact on our culture we can start to look more critically at what these media offer us and we can choose whether or not to accept the messages that they give. By studying Drama we become intelligent spectators who can distinguish between good and bad drama as well as ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ ideologies. We can start making informed decisions about the drama that we see.

Preparing to Study Drama

It is very important to see as much live theatre as you possibly can to help your Drama Studies. Most theatre companies offer generous discounts for University students. a lot of amateur of alternate theatre companies offer tickets that are extremely affordable. Watch out for performances by fellow ACU students in other units. By attending ACU productions, you will get an insight into what else you might study in your major as as give you a chance to learn more about the types of spaces that are available for performances on campus.