Diversity and Your Department

Resources for addressing diversity and inclusion

Theatre

Association for Theatre in Higher Education

  1. Association for Asian Performance
  2. Black Theatre Association; BTA's Facebook is more active than the BTA website
  3. Latino Focus Group; includes syllabi
  4. Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer Focus Group

These individual focus groups within the Association for Theatre in Higher Education provide valuable perspectives on the state of theatre in academia through the eyes of various minority groups. These would be useful for finding resources or experts.

Tags
Research

League of Professional Theatre Women. (2014). Women Count. from https://theatrewomen.org/women-count/

This resource counts the number of women employed Off-Broadway over the last four theatrical seasons. This data is useful to empirically examine the state of professional theatre for women who may be about to enter that industry.

Bowles, N. (2005). Why Devise? Why Now? "Houston, We Have a Problem.". Theatre Topics, 15(1), 15-21. (PDF)

This article emphasizes the importance of diversity and inclusion in the creation of devised or collaborative theatre. This would be helpful for professors thinking of including devised theatre on their curriculum.

Cherne, B. (2013). Empathy as a Diversity Teaching Tool: A Performance-Based Class in Multicultural Dramatic Literature. Theatre Topics, 23(1), 69-81. (PDF)

This article explores the utility of performance in breaking down negative cultural perceptions and harmful "Othering" effects of minority students. It argues that the performance of theatrical texts outside of the western canon, done sensitively, can lead to a more rich and empathetic understanding between students of varied backgrounds.

Fliotsos, A. Interactive Theatre Group, White Paper. from https://www.athe.org/?page=White_Papers#IntTheatre

This paper presents a number of statistics reported from interactive campus theatre troupes across the country; these theatre troupes are often directly concerned with on-campus diversity. This would be helpful to both curricular and extracurricular theater programs on campus, so that they could see larger interests at play in colleges across the country.

Tags
Statistics

O'Brien, C., Kroner, C., & Placier, P. (2015). Deaf Culture and Academic Culture: Cultivating Understanding Across Cultural and Linguistic Boundaries. Journal of Diversity in Higher Education, 8(2), 104-119. (PDF)

This highly theoretical work examines an experimental teaching experience that exposed students to Deaf Culture through the methodology of the Theatre of the Oppressed. This allowed the students to express and discuss misconceptions they have with Deaf people and gain further insight into life as a differently-abled person. This study would be helpful to any Theatre professor who is interested in teaching, discussing, or directing works that include Deaf and differently-abled characters.