Our Research
Research Centres
- Centre for Applied Theatre Research
- Centre for Screen Studies
- In Place of War
- Performance, Learning and 'Heritage'
- Theatre in Prisons and Probation Centre
- Manchester Centre for Music in Culture
Research Seminars, Conferences and Festivals
Drama scored 85% in the top two categories of the 2008 RAE. All staff are research-active within the four main strands that comprise our particular profile: theatre studies, applied theatre, screen studies, and music and drama studies. These areas interlink, and both staff and students are keen to cross the boundaries from one area of research to another. The notion of 'dialogue' - with ideas, practices, and communities - is at the heart of all our practical and intellectual explorations.
Research Projects
Recent major grants, awards and prizes for staff in Drama include the following:
Professor James Thompson is currently managing In Place of War: a large-scale AHRC project exploring the relationship between performance and war. Researching performance from sites of armed conflict and by artists and communities displaced by war, the project aims to generate evidence of how performance responds to war.
Anthony Jackson (Emeritus Professor), whose internationally-acclaimed research centres on theatre in education and heritage sites, is the 2003 recipient of the Judith Kase-Cooper Honorary Research Award from the American Alliance for Theatre & Education. He was also the director of another major AHRC project, Performance, Learning and Heritage: the uses of performance as a medium of learning in museums and historic sites. The project examined the increasing and varied use being made of theatre and drama-based activity as interpretive tools, and conducted longitudinal audience/visitor research to gauge its effectiveness. In collaboration with Manchester Museum, the project also commissioned a new professional performance piece to test research findings as they begin to emerge.
Dr Rajinder Dudrah completed an AHRC-funded project on Bollywood cinema, diasporic and transnational media in 2006; and more recently has curated and co-curated three national exhibitions on 'Celebrating Indian Cinema', 'Bollywood Stills' and 'Bhangra Music'.
These and other additional activities are connected to the three research centres in Drama: the Centre for Applied Theatre Research, the Centre for Screen Studies, and the Centre for Stage and Screen. The Centres initiate research projects, present seminar series, host conferences and produce two international peer-reviewed journals: South Asian Popular Culture (Routledge, edited by Dr Rajinder Dudrah), and Nineteenth-century Theatre and Film (Manchester University Press, edited by Professor Viv Gardner).
Theatre in Prisons
Another valuable research resource is the Theatre in Prisons and Probation Centre (TiPP). Originally established as an initiative by staff within Drama, TiPP is also based in the Martin Harris Centre for Music and Drama. Funded by the Arts Council and other bodies, it works through the arts with offenders and related communities in order to stimulate growth and change. It develops and implements participatory arts projects and undertakes training for artists and professionals from the Criminal Justice System. For further information, please see TiPP's website at www.TIPP.org.uk