The School of Theatre and Dance participates with the faculties in Interdisciplinary Arts, Art, Music, and Philosophy in an interdisciplinary program leading to the Doctor of Philosophy with a major in Fine Arts. Students engage a core curriculum of 15 hours that emphasizes interdisciplinarity among the arts: four required courses include a colloquium that explores disciplinary formation and types of interdisciplinary engagement; arts histories; arts research in contemporary contexts; and philosophical aesthetics. An additional approved topics or aesthetics course completes a student’s core program.
Fine Arts doctoral students whose disciplinary track is Theatre are required to take 18 hours of Theatre Foundation courses, including THA 5350 (Seminar in Theatre Research Methods) in their first semester of study. Additionally, they are required to complete THA 5351 (Theatre in the Community) at some point during their three years of coursework. The remaining 12 hours (four classes) of Foundation Coursework are chosen from a list of approved foundation courses, according to the student’s interests or needs.
Theatre Track students will round out their doctoral studies by choosing 15 hours (five courses) of elective graduate-level courses in Theatre or Dance, regardless of Area, provided that their choices are approved by their academic advisor, the course instructor, and the Graduate Advisor. Students may consider it necessary to their dissertation research to take courses outside of Theatre and Dance offerings. In such cases, the approval of their academic advisor and the Theatre Track Coordinator is required.
Work toward the degree is both scholarly and practical, requires a minimum of 60 semester hours at the graduate level beyond the master’s degree, includes a rigorous comprehensive examination, and culminates in a dissertation that allows a choice of several avenues of research created through traditional research, a professional problem, or an internship. The residence requirement for the doctoral program with major in Fine Arts is fulfilled by satisfactory completion of 18 semester hours of graduate coursework during one 12-month period.
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