The MA Performance Practice (Dance) programme is the first practice-based programme of its kind in South Asia. With its integrative curriculum that includes physical training, choreography, critical thinking and inter-disciplinary studies, the programme will equip its participants to redefine and rearticulate the boundaries of dance practice as performers, creators, researchers, pedagogues or managers through a critical engagement with the embodied cultures and the evolving dance ecology of the Indian subcontinent. Through a supportive dialogue that enables students to develop and refine their work, students are encouraged to become agents of their own learning.

At the end of this programme, students will be reflexive practitioners who engage in the disciplines of dancing and making with a sensitive and critical approach. They will have an informed understanding of the complexities of the field and its historical and cultural contexts. They will also be able to identify ways in which they might enter and contribute to the evolving dance ecologies of the Indian subcontinent.

The Programme is two years in duration with four semesters. A semester is 16 weeks long.

Students should register for a minimum of 16 credits each term and need to earn 64 credits to complete the programme successfully. They may register for more credits on payment of extra fees.

All students of SCCE MA programmes need to take three common Foundational Courses, one each in the first three semesters, for 12 credits in total. In the spirit of fostering interdisciplinary learning, they are encouraged to take four Elective courses offered by the School or any other School in the University, one each in all the four semesters, for 16 credits in total. They need to take seven compulsory Core courses pertaining to their respective discipline for 28 credits in total. Their MA Dissertation work in the final semester will earn them 8 credits.

Courses

The Foundation Courses that are common to all students of the School provide them with exposure to key texts in Critical Theory and Cultural Studies. The Elective Courses offered in the School explore interdisciplinary grounds of all the four programmes

The core courses focus on enabling a somatic approach to movement training and choreography and composition skills and a critical contextual awareness, with detailed technical understanding grounded in a curious, investigative approach. Reading and Writing Dance enables students to develop key skills of observation and articulation to engage with their own dance practice as well as that of others. Dance Histories, Ecologies and Identities attempts to map the field of dance history in India through a critical overview of forms, practitioners, institutions and patterns of patronage. The Embodied Practice series looks at embodiment as a process, instead of an outcome. They deepen one’s somatic understanding and immerse students into the ways in which rigorous, new approaches can arise from a critical engagement with forms and techniques. In Practice in Context, students acquire the knowledge and skills pertaining to diverse dimensions of practice, cultivating an emergent creative voice, interrogating the role of the performer, and identifying a specific interest in the field.

The elective courses are conceptual and practical in nature. They include two courses in the Embodied Practice series, where students experience and examine dance pedagogies arrived at through the deeply invested movement research of a number of key practitioners, eventually arriving at their own pedagogical questions and areas of concern, Body Space Time, which looks at the body as a dynamic material by deconstructing notions of space and time in relation to performance and choreography, and Investigating Choreographic Principles, Methodologies and Form, which examines the creative processes of current and historical practitioners specifically in terms of the choices they make about form, content and methodology through 3-4 intensive blocks of studio work with visiting practitioners.

Course Requirements

Each course has its specific set of requirements which are spelt out during the orientation programme where the courses are presented. The requirements may consist of regular attendance, classroom participation, written assignments of different lengths, classroom presentations, process journals, take-home exams and so on. There are no term-end exams written without books under supervision.

The successful completion of the programme will depend on the completion of the required number of courses, voluntary participation in all activities of the School, writing and/or presenting a dissertation and completing an internship at the end of the second year.

List Of Electives

1. Body Space Time (Semester 1)

2. Investigating Choreographic Principles, Methodologies and Form (Semester 2)

3. Embodied Practice 3: Critical Explorations (Semester 3)

4. Embodied Practice 4: Technique and Pedagogy (Semester 4)

List Of Foundation Courses

1. Critical Theory

2. Cultural Studies

3. Theories of Marginality