Call for TECHNE Collaborative Doctoral Award PhD Applications: Roehampton University / The Lyric Theatre

Call for TECHNE Collaborative Doctoral Award PhD Applications: Roehampton University / The Lyric Theatre

About the Project:

The studentship will commence in October 2023, with an option to study part time if required. This opportunity is full funded

There have been a number of initiatives to challenge the predominance of white, able-bodied, middle-class, cisgendered actors on stage. Groups like the Casting Collective have met with a degree of success in this regard. Likewise, training programmes that prepare young artists for university-level conservatory training have increasingly focused on groups traditionally under-represented on stage. Quite aside from the questionable veracity of directors who maintain that they cannot find any under-represented actors to cast, however, there is a disconnect between training and casting in the current model. Plays like Jasmine Lee Jones’ Curious (2021) explore the struggles that black students face in drama schools that have training techniques designed for and by white actors. What would it mean to radically re-envision actor training as the first step in imagining a new form of theatrical practice that was, from the ground-up, based on with equality, diversity and inclusion as guiding principles?

The Lyric’s new, free training programme—Springboard – launches in January 2023. This programme will recruit twenty 18-25 year-old artists from under-represented groups with no requirements for prior training. These artists will work alongside the professional actors at the Lyric, apprenticing to become part of the Lyric company. Rather than entering drama school (which will reproduce patterns that have not proved wholly effective), the goal of this training is to allow for a co-design process—the development of an artistic community. The Lyric intends to develop and fine-tune its training methods in order to then disseminate these methods world-wide. The PhD student would actively engage in designing this new training technique. Questions of access, casting / representation and training are active components of our field. The Lyric’s new, experimental approach provides a PhD student the chance to directly engage with these issues and to intervene in the training to workshop new possibilities.

The proposed PhD project might address any combination of the following: --The relationship between actor training and EDI initiatives in the UK -- Pedagogies of the oppressed / revolutionary pedagogies Page 3 of 5 --Actor training as practiced in the Global East and South -- Manifestos for inclusive theatre practice. -- Barriers to access and modes of incorporating accessibility at all levels of the training and production. How do the power structures of traditional arts pedagogies interact with the ability to create? How do these structures limit the ability of theatre to change itself or the world? What manner of interactions (apprenticeships, co-design) will promote different responses? What models exist in context within or beyond the UK that might inform a rethinking of actor training?

Eligibility

This studentship is open to both Home and International applicants. Applicants should ideally have or expect to receive a relevant Masters-level qualification by the time of taking up the appointment, or be able to demonstrate equivalent experience in a professional setting.

 Candidates should apply through Roehampton's online portal by Friday 27^th January 2022.

https://www.roehampton.ac.uk/graduate-school/degrees/

All prospective students are strongly advised to first make informal contact with the lead supervisor Dr Glenn Odom (Glenn.Odom@Roehampton.ac.uk).

Please view full detailed advert found on Roehampton website here

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