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  2. Theatre as Change [DST2255]

School: Education

This unit information may be updated and amended immediately prior to semester. To ensure you have the correct outline, please check it again at the beginning of semester.

  • Unit Title

    Theatre as Change

  • Unit Code

    DST2255

  • Year

    2025

  • Enrolment Period

    1

  • Version

    1

  • Credit Points

    15

  • Full Year Unit

     N

  • Mode of Delivery

    On Campus

  • Unit Coordinator

    Ms Tammy GREEN

Description

A study of theatre practitioners and playwrights who have questioned the values and politics of their cultures/society. Experimentation with form and content will be examined, and the course will cover areas of political and minority theatre.

Learning Outcomes

On completion of this unit students should be able to:

  1. Analyse the contribution made to theatre by playwrights from minority groups.
  2. Demonstrate the various experiments playwrights and directors carried out with content, form and methods of writing and performance.
  3. Explore and analyse the use of theatre as a political avenue.
  4. Identify the practitioners/playwrights who used theatre and its conventions to affect change in society.

Unit Content

  1. Collaborative writing and devising: e.g. Forum Theatre, Welfare State International Theatre, Joint Stock (Caryl Churchill), the Open Theatre and Schechner, Documentary Theatre, Community Plays.
  2. Experimental forms: e.g. Epic theatre (Brecht, Theatre Workshop, John McGrath), theatre of the Absurd (Jarry, Beckett, Pinter) anti-realism (Pirandello, Artaud).
  3. Realism revolutionary ideas expressed in conventional form, e.g. Ibsen, Strindberg, Sartre, Osborne.
  4. Satire use of comedy to criticise society, e.g. Arstophances, Moliere, Shaw, Ionesco.
  5. The Theatre of the Oppressed (Augusto Boal).
  6. Theatre as a political statement, e.g. Bond, Fo, Brenton, Churchill.

Learning Experience

Students will attend on campus classes as well as engage in learning activities through ECU's LMS

JoondalupMount LawleySouth West (Bunbury)
Semester 1Not Offered13 x 3 hour seminarNot Offered

For more information see the Semester Timetable

Additional Learning Experience Information

Practical workshops Seminars

Assessment

GS1 GRADING SCHEMA 1 Used for standard coursework units

Students please note: The marks and grades received by students on assessments may be subject to further moderation. All marks and grades are to be considered provisional until endorsed by the relevant School Progression Panel.

ON CAMPUS
TypeDescriptionValue
PerformancePerformance60%
EssayEssay40%

Disability Standards for Education (Commonwealth 2005)

For the purposes of considering a request for Reasonable Adjustments under the Disability Standards for Education (Commonwealth 2005), inherent requirements for this subject are articulated in the Unit Description, Learning Outcomes and Assessment Requirements of this entry. The University is dedicated to provide support to those with special requirements. Further details on the support for students with disabilities or medical conditions can be found at the Access and Inclusion website.

Assessment

Students please note: The marks and grades received by students on assessments may be subject to further moderation. Informal vivas may be conducted as part of an assessment task, where staff require further information to confirm the learning outcomes have been met. All marks and grades are to be considered provisional until endorsed by the relevant School Progression Panel.

Academic Integrity

Integrity is a core value at Edith Cowan University, and it is expected that ECU students complete their assessment tasks honestly and with acknowledgement of other people's work as well as any generative artificial intelligence tools that may have been used. This means that assessment tasks must be completed individually (unless it is an authorised group assessment task) and any sources used must be referenced.

Breaches of academic integrity can include:

Plagiarism

Copying the words, ideas or creative works of other people or generative artificial intelligence tools, without referencing in accordance with stated University requirements. Students need to seek approval from the Unit Coordinator within the first week of study if they intend to use some of their previous work in an assessment task (self-plagiarism).

Unauthorised collaboration (collusion)

Working with other students and submitting the same or substantially similar work or portions of work when an individual submission was required. This includes students knowingly providing others with copies of their own work to use in the same or similar assessment task(s).

Contract cheating

Organising a friend, a family member, another student or an external person or organisation (e.g. through an online website) to complete or substantially edit or refine part or all of an assessment task(s) on their behalf.

Cheating in an exam

Using or having access to unauthorised materials in an exam or test.

Serious outcomes may be imposed if a student is found to have committed one of these breaches, up to and including expulsion from the University for repeated or serious acts.

ECU's policies and more information about academic integrity can be found on the student academic integrity website.

All commencing ECU students are required to complete the Academic Integrity Module.

Assessment Extension

In some circumstances, Students may apply to their Unit Coordinator to extend the due date of their Assessment Task(s) in accordance with ECU's Assessment, Examination and Moderation Procedures - for more information visit https://askus2.ecu.edu.au/s/article/000001386.

Special Consideration

Students may apply for Special Consideration in respect of a final unit grade, where their achievement was affected by Exceptional Circumstances as set out in the Assessment, Examination and Moderation Procedures - for more information visit https://askus2.ecu.edu.au/s/article/000003318.

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