For Unit 3 Area of Study 3 (analysing a professional performance), students must apply terminology that is specific to the performance styles and contemporary practices evident in the production they attended. This note focuses on the specialised vocabulary needed for professional performance analysis.
Epic Theatre (Brechtian) Terminology
- Verfremdungseffekt (V-Effekt): estrangement or alienation effect; techniques that interrupt emotional identification.
- Gestus: a social gesture that encapsulates a character’s class position or social relationship.
- Historification: setting the action in a past moment to create critical distance on the present.
- Narration: a performer stepping outside the action to comment or describe events.
- Episodic structure: a play built from discrete scenes that each make their own point, rather than building to a single climax.
- Didactic: having a moral or political teaching intention.
Physical Theatre Terminology
- Movement score: a fixed, repeatable sequence of physical actions.
- Physical vocabulary: a set of movements or gestures unique to a character or ensemble.
- Ensemble unison / canon: all performers moving together (unison) or following each other with a delay (canon).
- Transformation: shifting from one character, object or location to another through physical means.
- Object transformation: using a single prop to represent multiple objects through the performer’s relationship with it.
Documentary / Verbatim Theatre Terminology
- Verbatim text: words taken directly from interviews or real sources, reproduced precisely.
- Documentary evidence: factual material (statistics, quotes, images) integrated into the performance.
- Composite character: a fictional character created from multiple real people’s voices and experiences.
- Testimonial: a first-person account addressed directly to the audience.
Absurdist Theatre Terminology
- Circularity: the structural device of returning to the play’s starting point (or near it).
- Non-sequitur: a statement or action that does not logically follow from what preceded it.
- Existential: relating to questions of existence, meaning and the human condition.
- Stasis: the condition of being motionless or unchanging; in Beckett, inaction is a central dramatic device.
| Term | Definition |
|---|---|
| Devised performance | Original work created collaboratively without a pre-existing script |
| Interdisciplinary | Drawing on multiple art forms simultaneously (theatre, dance, visual art, music) |
| Site-specific | Work created for and in response to a specific non-theatrical location |
| Immersive theatre | Work in which the audience physically enters and moves through the performance environment |
| Promenade theatre | Audience moves between performance spaces or follows performers through a space |
| Live art | Performance that emphasises the liveness and presence of the act, often blurring art/life boundaries |
| Dramaturgy | The structural and meaning-making logic of a performance; also the role of the dramaturg (who facilitates this) |
| Dramaturg | A collaborator who helps the creative team think about structure, meaning and context |
| Post-dramatic theatre | Theatre that moves beyond the primacy of the dramatic text or story; foregrounds performance itself |
| Hybrid form | A performance that draws on and combines conventions from multiple styles |
The purpose of these terms is not to display knowledge but to communicate precisely. In written analysis:
- Use only terms you can define and apply correctly.
- Pair each term with a specific example from the production.
- Do not use jargon as a substitute for analysis — the term is a shortcut to a meaning that must still be developed.
Example of strong application:
“The company’s use of gestus was evident in the recurring image of the factory owner rubbing his hands together — a single physical action that condensed an entire social attitude of self-congratulatory indifference into a repeatable visual sign. The audience’s growing recognition of this gestus across the production was itself a Brechtian device, inviting them to identify the social pattern rather than simply respond to an individual moment of greed.”
VCAA FOCUS: VCAA awards marks for terminology that demonstrates genuine understanding of its meaning and function in context. Using the correct word in the wrong context, or using it without a concrete example, will not attract marks for terminology accuracy.
