A presentation by Aaron Poe and Caleb McBroom.

A presentation by Aaron Poe and Caleb McBroom.

The Question

Is there a clique problem between

theatre technicians and

actors?

AMADEUS

For my ethnographic research paper I took a look at cliques in the theatre department here at TAMUCC. It interested me that there seemed to be a lack of such cliques in this theatre department, whereas in my high school theatre department the cliques were enormous and very divisive.

The Question

A Reminder of the Characteristics of a Discourse Community ;)

• “A discourse community has a broadly agreed set of common public goals.” (Swales, 1990)

• “A discourse community has mechanisms of intercommunication among its members.” (Swales, 1990)

• “A discourse community uses its participatory mechanisms primarily to provide information and feedback.” (Swales, 1990)

• “A discourse community utilizes and hence possesses one or more genres in the communicative furtherance of its aims.” (Swales, 1990)

• “In addition to owning genres a discourse community has required some specific lexis.” (Swales, 1990)

• “A discourse community has a threshold level of members with a suitable degree of relevant content and discoursal expertise.” (Swales, 1990)

The Community• For my community I took a up close look at the theatre

department here at TAMUCC. Because this is a college theatre department the obvious goal of the community is to prepare the students for being professionals out in “the real world”.

• The community has an enormous lexis with each sub-community (i.e. actors, directors, seamstresses, lighting technicians, etc) having an even more in depth and specialized vocabulary. Whenever I questioned a technical major about words he specifically uses only in this discourse community he listed off words even I had never heard of before.

The Community (cont.)

• There are many different ways that the members of this community can communicate with one another. An acting major I interviewed said that he mostly communicates through face to face interaction (Serna, 2011). A technical major I interviewed talked about how lighting technicians use a lot of diagrams to explain how they want to accomplish certain looks for shows (Whitmire, 2011). Through my own experience, I also observed communication via email and text messaging.

Method of Research The way I came about on the

research part of the ethnographic paper was that I went to the on campus library

and just looked up a whole bunch of articles on theatre.

Then from the info I had in front of me I just narrow it down to form my question because, I

went into this project not knowing what my question is but

only knowing the discourse community.

I also interviewed a technical design student at TAMUCC and she had said that “I don’t see I

big techie and actor clique, but I do see a upper classmen and

freshman clique.” (smith,2011)I have also observed in The Center of Arts building that there are some upper classmen that do stick with other upper classmen. But most of the time we all intermingle with each other.

Methods of Research

• When researching I used a lot of online databases in the hope of finding tons of relevant material. Useful sources were scant and it wasn’t until I interviewed someone that I really got some good information. In my paper I plan to use interviews of people I found to be in the theatre discourse community here at TAMUCC as my primary resource.

The Cliques

• One of the biggest groups of cliques that came to mind when researching the theatre discourse community was the big divide between acting students and technical students. In high school the conflict between these groups was enormous and constant so it often hampered everyone’s experience in shows.

• Other small cliques existed and were often sustained because of personal squabbles between 2 individuals. For example, in my high school my friend Robert really didn’t like my other friend Alexandra. Thus, the department was split into the people who were either friends with Robert or Alexandra.

Cliques (cont.)

• Through my research I found that everyone I interviewed felt the same way; that there was an absence of such cliques in the department here. People had their own personal qualms with one another sometimes, but overall a professional and congenial attitude was maintained throughout the department.

• One interviewee suggested that the lack of a divide between technical and acting/directing students was able to exist because in college it’s required that actors take technical student classes and vice-versa (Serna, 2011). This way, the two different groups are forced to intermingle and most even enjoy the diversity. For example, I enjoy my costume construction class very much and some of the nicest people I’ve met so far have been technical theatre majors.

• Another interviewee proposed that it was the overall heightened professionalism of each individual here that kept us from being so divided over personal issues. He even gave me an example of how he and another student here used to live together and now they don’t even talk, yet even this has not created a clique on either side (Whitmire, 2011). In a collegiate atmosphere such as this one where everyone is striving to become a professional in their respective field, personal differences seem not to matter as much in the face of the unified goals of the department.

Sources• Serna, David. Personal interview. 25 Oct. 2011.• Whitmire, Taylor. Personal interview. 6 Nov. 2011.• Smith, Jennifer. Personal interview. 14 Nov. 2011• Wardle, Elizabeth, and Doug Downs. Writing about writing: a college reader.

Boston: Bedford/St. Martins, 2011. Print.• [L-Arginine research and publications]. Retrieved Nov. 18, 2011, from: URL

(healthtechmall.com) • [Arts Festivals. Live theatre captioning]. Retrieved Nov 18,2011, from: URL

(captioningstudio.com)• [Magnum Opus: Researching your novel]. Retrieved Nov. 18, 2011, from: URL

(mithrilwisdom.blogspot.com)• [Writing about Writing: A College Reader – Trade paperback (2010)] Retrieved Nov.

18, 2011, from: URL (alibris.com)