EAST 110 - Japan on Stage and Screen: An Introduction to Kabuki, Noh, and Butoh

FC ARHU CD WINT

4 credits
This class introduces Japan’s most dynamic performing arts, including noh, kabuki, bunraku, avant garde butō, and plays on screen. We explore cultural, aesthetic, and historical contexts of Japanese theater from 8th century to today, as well as performance styles, staging, movement and music, costumes, gender, and audiences through lectures, readings, film screenings, and AMAM visits. A major theme is the ways these arts recast plots, structures & thematic elements of classical literary works such as the Tale of Genji, Heike, samurai stories, folk legends, and historical events.