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  • Tier 2 Canada Research Chair (CRC) in Indigenous Art Practice

    Wednesday, September 04, 2019 | By

    Brock University’s Marilyn I. Walker School of Fine and Performing Arts (MIWSFPA) invites applications for a Tier 2 Canada Research Chair (CRC) in Indigenous Art Practice at the rank of Assistant or Associate Professor.

    The CRC in Indigenous Art Practice will be appointed to one or more of the School’s academic units, depending on the successful applicant’s area(s) of knowledge and expertise. We recognize that in Indigenous art there may be no formal divisions between visual, theatrical, and musical art forms. Brock embraces diverse perspectives and pedagogical practices; it is hoped that the CRC in Indigenous Art Practice will help foster new collaborations across academic units and assist the School and university to move towards Indigenization. The CRC will be welcomed into a tight-knit, friendly, and dynamic community of artists, scholars, staff, and students that respects, promotes, and actively engages with Indigenous arts and culture within the University and Indigenous communities.

    Review of applications will begin on October 31, 2019, and will continue until the position is filled.

    For more information see the complete posting at brocku.wd3.myworkdayjobs.com/brocku_careers/job/St-Catharines-Downtown-Campus/Canada-Research-Chair—Tier-2—Indigenous-Art-Practice—Assistant-Associate-Professor-Tenure-Track_JR-1002413

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    Categories: Announcements, Faculty & Instructors, News, Uncategorised

  • We are hiring!

    Thursday, August 15, 2019 | By

    Two positions available:

    Marketing and Communications Officer

    full-time, this position includes full comprehensive benefits coverage, including tuition waiver.
    closing on August 24. see https://brocku.ca/careers/
    direct link: https://brocku.wd3.myworkdayjobs.com/brocku_careers/job/St-Catharines-Downtown-Campus/Marketing—Communications-Officer_JR-1004102

    Communications Assistant (Coop student position)

    full-time, 9 months, beginning September 2019
    tailored for Brock students in Marketing and Communications but other disciplines should apply
    closing on August 17 or until filled. see https://careerzone.brocku.ca

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    Categories: Announcements, News, Uncategorised

  • Brock researchers partner with community groups to dispel myths about homelessness in Niagara

    Thursday, July 11, 2019 | By

    Nadia Ganesh (BA ’19), of community theatre group Mirror Theatre, dramatizes the lived experience of homelessness, addiction and mental illness of women in Niagara in a video that is part of a new research study between Brock University, YWCA Niagara Region, Canadian Mental Health Association and Community Addictions Services of Niagara.

    originally published in The Brock News on Thursday, July 11, 2019 | by Sarah Ackles

    Through a partnership with local community organizations, Brock University is working to shed light on the complexities of homelessness for women in Niagara.

    In an effort to help break the ongoing cycle of mental illness, addiction and homelessness experienced by many women in the region, a pilot project was launched last year between Brock, YWCA Niagara Region, the Canadian Mental Health Association and Community Addictions Services of Niagara.

    Mental health and addictions services were brought in-house at the YWCA, providing women in need with the necessary services in a single location, reducing the need to repeatedly share their story to access different resources and helping to eliminate stigma related to their situation.

    Brock researchers Lynn McCleary and Joe Norris watch videos produced as part of a collaborative research project on homelessness, mental health and addictions with the YWCA Niagara, Canadian Mental Health Association and Community Addictions Services of Niagara.

    Brock researchers Lynn McCleary and Joe Norris watch videos produced as part of a collaborative research project on homelessness, mental health and addictions with the YWCA Niagara, Canadian Mental Health Association and Community Addictions Services of Niagara.

    Brock researchers and students investigated the impact of providing addictions and mental health counselling at YWCA Niagara emergency shelters, deeming the single-stop model more effective.

    The resulting research study, titled “The experiences of homeless women with mental illness of onsite partnership between women’s homeless shelters and mental health service providers,” was led by Principal Investigators Lynn McCleary, Professor of Nursing at Brock, and Elisabeth Zimmermann, Executive Director of YWCA Niagara.

    Co-investigators on the project included Joe Norris, Chair of Dramatic Arts at Brock, Brenda Grant, Mental Health Coach at the Canadian Mental Health Association and Cindy Jennings, Addictions Coach at Community Addictions Services of Niagara.

    The Women’s Xchange $15K Challenge, which supports research projects that address women’s health issues at the local level, funded the study.

    Zimmerman said it has been a positive and rewarding experience working with Brock on this important initiative.

    “It is very important to dispel myths and for the community to understand the complex nature of homelessness and the need for access to affordable housing, which has, and continues to be, at a crisis state in our community,” she said. “Too often, in terms of research, we find there isn’t a gender lens attached to the project — this seems to be particularly true of homelessness — so the other powerful result of this project is that it speaks to women’s experiences of homelessness.”

    McCleary said working on the study gave her a better appreciation for the importance of services like the YWCA, Canadian Mental Health Association and Addiction Service of Niagara, and the impact these services can have on people’s lives when they work collaboratively.

    It also connected the outreach work she does with social services in the community, both as a registered nurse and as a co-chair of Brock’s United Way Committee.

    “I know community agencies that receive United Way funding make a difference in the well-being of my students, my neighbours and my friends,” McCleary said. “Having the opportunity to listen to the women’s stories also connected me to my early clinical work as a mental health nurse and provided me with insights that will be helpful when I’m teaching Nursing students about nurse-client relationships and about mental health nursing.”

    The results of the study will be shared with service users and providers, and funders of mental health, addictions and housing services through forthcoming research publications and a series of videos created by Norris and community theatre group Mirror Theatre.

    Currently comprised of Brock students, staff and other community members, Mirror Theatre has created more than 70 social issues plays that explore everything from workplace safety, mental health, academic integrity, patient-centred care, alcohol abuse and the first-year university experience.

    “We dramatized testimonials from the women who accessed support services at the YWCA in order to develop short, educational videos that show the experiences these women felt on the street and in the shelter,” Norris said. “They are meant to be conversation starters that challenge our preconceptions of homelessness and those who experience it.”

    Mirror Theatre President and recent graduate Mike Metz (BA ’19, BEd ’19) hopes the videos will help to give a face to the issue of homelessness.

    “Ultimately, we are including the component of empathy into academic research, something that you do not always see,” he said. “We take research and we turn it into something that people can relate to, something they can understand. In doing this work, I have realized that people can act in different and more positive ways.”

    The videos are currently being edited by videographer Brad McDonald, a master’s student in Social Justice in Equity Studies at Brock. When completed, they will be available on Joe Norris’ Playbuilding website.

    Research publications are forthcoming.

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    Categories: Current Students, Events, Faculty & Instructors, In the Media, News, Uncategorised

  • DART Shaw Festival Internship 2019: WEEK 4 & 5 From First Reads to Tech

    Wednesday, June 12, 2019 | By

    Mae Smith is the Department of Dramatic Arts’ 2019 Shaw Intern.
    Read her weekly blogs about her work in lighting design and props building.
    Learn more about the internship. 

    (From: The DART Shaw Intern Blog, June 12, 2019 | By: Mae Smith)

    In the work light, between scenes, I read books I’ve borrowed from Kevin’s library in his office. Previously, I read about Jean Rosenthal and how she designed. Now, I’m reading more of a manual called The Assistant Lighting Designer’s Toolkit by Anne E. McMills. In there I find helpful tidbits and points to ask the technicians or designers about.

    As I said before, I love this The Ladykillers. The show itself is hilarious and so is the cast. During one of the on stage rehearsals, I’m laughing so hard that Judith Bowden asks if this was my first time seeing the show. I reply, “No, I just love it.”

    Outside of the Festival Theatre, I get the pleasure to sit in on the first rehearsals of Cyrano de Bergerac directed by Chris Abraham, and Man and Superman directed by Kimberley Rampersad. The first rehearsals are usually read throughs with the full cast and design presentations. Ahead of Cyrano, I meet with the stage manager Allen Teichman who graciously answers all my questions about his role and his duties at the start of the rehearsal process. The next day, I get to help out with some of those duties. I meet with Ashley Ireland, the assistant stage manager, and Allan to tape out the floor and set up tables for the read through.

    The Courthouse Theatre’s main rehearsal hall set for CYRANO DE BERGERAC’s (2019) first rehearsal.

    Cyrano‘s first read was really fun and I was in awe of the actors lifting the words of the page in almost complete stillness. I’m really excited to see it all set up in a couple months and think back to how it was when it started.

    The Man and Superman first read was equally entertaining although I left half-way through (the show is long). Again, though, the actors already bring so much to the table even after director Kimberley Rampersad asks them to not see the read through as a performance but rather as their first time meeting the text all together.

    I’m really grateful for the chance to see so many different shows at so many different stages. I’m able to learn about so many different roles and what would be expected of me if I was working with these shows which is a great thing to have before I am actually expected to do anything.

    At the end of my fifth week, I get to really enjoy myself as I attend the opening of Brigadoon. It’s been a little while since I last saw the show and I’m excited to enjoy it fully without listening to cues. It is so nice to hear such a large audience reacting with me to the show. It’s an energy I hadn’t yet experience with Brigadoon and it’s just nice to hear the show being so well received watching it quietly during tech.

    In my coming weeks, tech for The Ladykillers continues and I attend my first calls for Sex for which Bonnie Beecher is designing the lights. I’ve been watching others in the prop shop upholster the furniture for the show so I’m keen on seeing what the show really looks like.

    Keep checking back for a new post coming soon!

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    Categories: Alumni, News, Shaw Intern Blog, Uncategorised

  • DART Faculty co-direct a Play in Four Hours at Curriculum and Pedagogy conference in New Orleans

    Wednesday, October 31, 2018 | By

    Classroom Territoriality (Left to Right) Joe Norris, Rich Edmonson, Sharon Gile, Rick Breault, Janis McTeer

    A Play in Four Hours

    Using the playbuilding research process,Dramatic Arts Chair Joe Norris and graduate student Kevin Hobbs co-directed delegates at the Curriculum and Pedagogy conference in New Orleans, Oct. 17 and 18.

    After two, one and one-half hour devising sessions, and a one-hour rehearsal, they performed their series of nine vignettes, entitled: The Shape of School, at the closing conference event. The emergent themes included territoriality of classroom spaces, the pervasiveness of heteronormativity in the school yard, forms of administrative control of students and teachers, perceived status of particular schools and competing educational philosophies. It was concluded that these and other issues are strong undercurrents that contribute to the ethos of school experiences.

    Audience members participated in workshopping the scenes through body sculpting and discussions, with one conference delegate claiming that the images and issues would haunt her for some time to come.

     In addition to Norris and Hobbs, the participating playwrights were Rick Breault, Ashland University; Sharon Gile, Claflin University; Janis McTeer, Kent State University; Karen Morris, RJ Reynold High School, North Carolina; Sam Tanner, Penn State University; and Miryam Espinosa-Dulanto, Rich Edmonson, and Zulema Williams all from University of Texas, Rio Grande Valley.

     

    The Shape of Schools (Left to Right) Kevin Hobbs, Sam Tanner, Sharon Gile, Janis McTeer

    Leave it at the Door (Left to Right) Sharon Gile, Janis McTeer, Kevin Hobbs and Rick Breault

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

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    Categories: Events, Faculty & Instructors, News, Uncategorised

  • Brock prof and alumna explore circus performance in joint publication

    Thursday, September 13, 2018 | By

    Associate Professor of Dramatic Arts Karen Fricker and MA graduate Hayley Malouin at the conference Circus and its Others II in Prague this past August. The two have recently published a special double issue of Performance Matters, titled “Circus and Its Others,” exploring questions around circus performance and gender, difference and dis/ability. (Photo by David Konecny)

    (From The Brock News, Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2018 | by Alison Innes)

    For many people, the circus is a place of mystery and wonder, filled with the extraordinary, unusual and strange.

    But what does it mean to be different and what does it mean to perform those differences?

    For Associate Professor of Dramatic Arts Karen Fricker and Brock alumna Hayley Malouin (BA ’15, MA ’17), these questions have led to a joint publication in the emerging field of circus studies.

    The pair launched a special double issue of the journal Performance Matters, titled “Circus and Its Others,” Aug. 28 in Prague at the similarly named Circus and Its Others II conference.

    Inspired by the inaugural Encounters with Circus and its Others conference organized by Fricker with assistance from Malouin in 2016, the publication features contributions from established scholars, graduate students and circus artists from around the world. Many of the contributors were in Prague to participate in the second conference and celebrate at the launch.

    The conference series brings together scholars from around the world to explore questions about the place of difference and “otherness” in contemporary circus.

    “We’re asking questions about circus in a way that allows people who have been working at these questions from different perspectives and different places to jump on board,” says Fricker.

    Malouin, who has an undergraduate degree from Brock in Dramatic Arts, explored ideas of public performance, political protest and public performance of the grotesque as part of her MA in Studies in Comparative Literature and the Arts.

    “Circus is an interesting cultural touchstone because it reflects societal norms about people, community and politics. This is in contrast to the image of circus – which circuses themselves cultivate – as existing on the margins of society,” says Malouin.

    The special issue of Performance Matters was her first foray into academic publishing. In addition to co-editing the issue with Fricker, Malouin worked with other circus scholars, including Brock student Taylor Zajdlik (BA ’15, MA ’17), on a section of the journal exploring questions of queerness and freakery in the circus.

    “It was a great experience to establish myself as someone with those skills,” says Malouin. “I really care about the work, I feel it’s important. It’s a substantial contribution to an emerging field.”

    The special edition also includes work by DART Associate Professor David Fancy on disability and the circus, making reference to a creative research project in which he participated involving intellectually disabled survivors of institutional abuse.

    The questions Fricker and Malouin are researching have application beyond the circus to culture as a whole.

    “What we’re looking at is how questions about difference and otherness play out in certain practices in the contemporary moment,” says Fricker. “And more broadly we’re asking, how do we work to make culture more inclusive?”

    The full issue can be read online for free.

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    Categories: Events, Media Releases, Uncategorised

  • ONE ACT FESTIVAL 2018: Expectation vs. Reality

    Monday, March 12, 2018 | By

    Theatre students take charge in Brock University’s ONE ACT FESTIVAL 2018!

    Every year, Brock University’s Department of Dramatic Arts presents an exciting festival of one-act plays, directed, designed and starring the bright and talented students of the Marilyn I. Walker School of Fine and Performing Arts. This year’s ONE ACT FESTIVAL 2018 will be held at the Marilyn I. Walker Theatre on March 24 and 25, 2018, and promises an engaging and diverse variety of experiences for the theatre-going audience.

    When: Saturday, March 24 and Sunday, March 25 (NOTE: this represents a change from dates published in the Season Brochure)

    Time: 7:00 p.m.

    Articulation by Alicia Richardson
    directed by Jazmine Jeffrey

    Your Mother’s Butt by Allan Ball
    directed by Sumer Seth

    Echo by Joseph T. Shipley
    directed by Isaac Brown

    The Little Stone House by George Calderon
    directed by Colin Williams

    The Lesson by Eugene Ionesco
    directed by Kristina Ojaperv

    The St. Valentine’s Day Massacre by Allan Knee
    directed by Alyson Markov

    The Marilyn I. Walker Theatre | 15 Artists’ Common, St. Cathrines
    Admission: pay-what-you-can | Limited paid parking available
    brocku.ca/dramaticarts

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  • The Flu Season

    Sunday, March 13, 2016 | By

    Showtime: April 14 – 16, 2016, Curtain at 7:30 pm

    Location: the Dramatic Arts Theatre at 15 Artists’ Common

    Will Eno’s “The Flu Season” plays whack-a-mole with everything you expect love to be.

    On stage in the Dramatics Arts Theatre, this Oppenheimer award-winning play has been selected by the graduating dramatic arts students as the strangest, most theatrical screen shot of the state of romantic affairs today.

    This unexpected comedy comes from the playwright the New York Times hails as “a Samuel Beckett for the Jon Stewart generation.”

    Romance is hacked and hijacked when a man and woman meet in a “retreat centre” that is surely unique in the known universe. They are under the observation of technicians and caretakers who are themselves infected by the multiplying pathetic fallacies of romance. Lovers are mad. Love hurts. Love makes you do crazy things. Love is The Flu Season.

    Guided by director and Professor Gyllian Raby, the 4F56 company includes: Elizabeth Amos, Eliza Anthony, Kelsey Burcher, Mary Askwith, Maria Evers, Alex Franks, Mark Harrigan, Robert Herr, Daryl Hunter, Jeremy Knapton, Katelyn Lander, Kevin Langendyk, Cole Larson, Oriana Marrone, Melinda Mohammed, Josh Sanger, and Raylene Turner.

    The Flu Season runs April 14, 15, and 16, at 7:30 pm, in the Dramatic Arts Theatre at the Marilyn I.Walker School of Fine and Performing Arts, 15 Artists’ Common, in downtown St. Catharines. Tickets are $5 (applicable fees and taxes are extra) and can be purchased at the door, or through the FirstOntario Performing Arts Centre Box Office. email: boxoffice@firstontariopac.ca; or visit online at: firstontariopac.ca

    You can receive a $2 discount on your ticket with a purchase of a meal of $5 or more from the following participating downtown eatries: Mahtay Café, Rise Above, The Bull BBQ Pit, Sky Bar Lounge at Brock University, Bella Noella’s Pizzeria, Gwen’s Teas, and So Jollof. Simply bring your restaurant receipt or voucher to the FirstOntario Performing Arts Centre Box Office to receive this discount. This offer is not available online.

    Limited paid parking is available on-site, however, there are more than 1,000 spots available in nearby parking garages, surface lots and on city streets within a five-minute walk to our address at 15 Artists’ Common. Visit http://www.stcatharines.ca/en/livein/ParkingLotsGarages.asp for a list of parking locations.

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