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Handbook Appendices Forms Theatre Scholarships For Theatre Majors, Minors, and Intendeds University Theatre Handbook Table of Contents Theatre Home

• A.3  CAREER OPPORTUNITIES

 The following items are for discussion with mom, dad, and other loving persons with reservations about your interest in Theatre, and especially as a possible career choice.

A.3.a  Liberation. 

First off, let’s agree that the goal of a liberal arts education is not the same as that for trade school training (in the case of theatre, a performance conservatory).  Liberal studies are designed to provide personal growth and perspective, develop thinking and imagination skills, envision a wider world in which to live; literally liberating, setting free, allowing choice.  Such study is a precursor to, and foundational for, discovering your life task, your vocation or “calling.”  It’s a time for exploring your desires, discovering your gifts and testing your abilities.  It’s not taking time out, but rather the opposite,  It’s taking time to sharpen a vision for your life.  And the time you get to spend at the task is all too short.

It’s also about having something to say to the world once you acquire the techniques and polished skills to say it.

 
In the liberal tradition, the theatre curriculum seeks to assist you in

1) developing a defini­tive and applicable awareness of your personal faith and values,

2) seeking opportu­nities to explore and develop your gifts and personal skills,

3) enhancing your abili­ties for analysis and criticism, and

4) exploring the distinctive ways of knowing embraced by the arts, the manner in which a theatre artist “thinks” and “signifies.” 

And in accomplishing these tasks, the theatre curriculum also seeks to provide you with special­ized training of a pre-professional nature which will facilitate additional graduate study or provide an entering wedge to a career in theatre.

So, your education in this environment is less about career training than it is about testing your mettle as an artist, your calling to theatre as “vocation.”  Your career will probably change several times during your lifetime.  If it’s a genuine gift, your calling as artist will not.

Next Section: A3b: Skills Enhancement

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