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Davis: Departments

Dermatology
There is no history currently available for this department. See School of Medicine.

Design
See Environmental Design --Design.

Dramatic Art and Speech
When the College of Letters and Science was formed in 1951, the Department of Literature and Language divided and one of the divisions became the Department of English, Dramatic Art, and Speech. Until that time, all dramatic activities were extracurricular. The first formal courses in dramatic art were offered in 1953. In 1961, the Department of Dramatic Art and Speech was established.

The A.B. degree with a major in dramatic art and speech was first offered in 1959. In 1963, a dramatic art major was established; by 1965 there were 17 undergraduate students in this program. M.A. degree programs in dramatic art involving either creative or research theses or comprehensive examinations were inaugurated in 1962. In 1965, there were 22 graduate students in dramatic art and there was a faculty of nine; there were five faculty members in speech and six dramatic art and speech majors with a speech emphasis.

At that time, the department based its dramatic art curricula on the philosophy that dramatic art is one of the fine arts involving a creative collaboration by several artists (actors, playwrights, directors, designers) culminating in a work of dramatic art presented before an audience. The courses offered gave students an opportunity for creative experience in dramatic art and contributed to their understanding of the art through this experience as well as through a study of its history and theory. As part of the department's academic program and as a public service, seven productions were presented to the public each year.

It was planned that dramatic art and speech would separate in July, 1966 to form the Department of Dramatic Art and the Department of Rhetoric. Until that time the department continued to offer courses in speech which were part of the combined major in dramatic art and speech. In 1966, the combined major was discontinued and the speech courses were assimilated into an undergraduate major in rhetoric and public address. Dramatic art had three public performance theaters in operation by 1966--a flexible proscenium theater which seated 550, a small theater which could adapt to various seating arrangements, and the Wyatt Pavilion Theater (opened in 1963), which had a thrust stage and seated 221. The first two were in the Dramatic Art Building that was completed in 1966. source

See also Departments of English, Communication and Theatre and Dance.

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