Thinking Through Script Analysis - Softcover

Burgoyne, Suzanne; Downey, Patricia

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1585103616 ISBN 13: 9781585103614

Publisher: Focus, 2011

Synopsis

Burgoyne and Downey's text in Script Analysis covers all aspects of the traditional course, but in a framework that extends the subject beyond the needs of this course. While instructing students in the process of turning a written text into a performance, it uses the  broad tool of critical thinking to provide students with tools that they will then be able to use in theater as well as in their studies in other courses -- as well as in their lives. Bringing the higher level thinking skills to script analysis enlivens the course while broadening its appeal to students who may well come from outside the theater major. 

The tools brought to bear throughout the book include challenging misconceptions, structuring the thought process, drawing from everyday life examples, carefully building skills one upon another as the student masters them, encouraging students in group work, and providing direction in managing the student's thought and creative processes. The book thus uses the scope of script analysis to improve skills in close reading, critical thinking, effective writing, productive group work, and "mental management."

About this title

From the Back Cover

The real strength of this book is the focus on developing critical and creative thinking by making the process of script analysis enjoyable. The authors make analysis understandable. Students will be able to apply the skills they learn to other aspects of life and study. Robin D. Stone
Associate Professor of Theatre, Roger Williams University
This book will be of primary help for student actors who want to understand how to analyze their roles effectively in the context of the entire play – no small feat! The definition and terminology used in Chapter 4 for the Root Action Statements will assist theatre artists who want to synthesize and summarize the meaning and power of a play. Dr. Harry Parker
Chair, Department of Theatre, Texas Christian University
....this book illustrates an important approach to helping students more deeply master some key goals of undergraduate education: close reading, critical thinking, effective writing, productive group work and “mental management.” Readers will find it interesting to see how these themes and tools are applied throughout the book.Craig E. Nelson
Emeritus Professor, Indiana University at Bloomington

About the Author

Suzanne Burgoyne is Curators’ Teaching Professor of Theatre at the University of Missouri. She was named a Carnegie Scholar (Scholarship of Teaching and Learning) in 2000-2001, and was received the Association for Theatre in Higher Education’s Outstanding Teacher Award in 2003. In 2012 she was a recipient of the Writing Intensive Teaching Excellence Award for her design and teaching of the course on which Thinking Through Script Analysis was based.
Patricia Downey is an Assistant Professor of Musical Theatre at the University of South Dakota with special interests in  movement and dance.

Edition details

• Publisher: Focus
• Publication date: 2011
• ISBN 10: 1585103616
• ISBN 13: 9781585103614
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 244