Intro to Theatre Notes 1

most contemporary theories to the origin of theatre revolve around

• oral tradition

• ritual

• playwrighting

• plays

Older theories of the origin of theatre include an overrepresentation and importance of ______

• oral traditions

• rituals

• written word

• scripting

The actual speaking or singing of a story is known as written tradition. True or false?

• True

• False

Answer explanation

Oral tradition. This existed long before the written text and is ephemeral.

______ is often presented as literature in high school, but is actually an example of campfire story time (performances).

• Iliad and The Odyssey

• Beowulf

• The Proscenium Arch

• Meditations

Rituals are

• transformative

• arbitrary (alogical)

• highly structured

• involving special objects

______is/are culturally relative

• Rituals

• Actors

• Playwrights

• Logocentrism

In ________ there is something called the fourth wall between the actors and the audience

• theatrical conventions

• modern theatre

• Western theatre

• aesthetic distance

What is the triumvirate of theatre?

• actor

• director

• playwright

• staging

Playwrights

• structure the play

• enacts the play

• shapes the play

• all of the above

Answer explanation

Historically, playwrights have done all of these things. In modern times, they mostly just structure, but in Western history they would do all three.

Reliance on written text as superior is known as

• logocentrism

• ethnocentrism

• textilecentrism

• Western favoritism