NIU Open Education Collection

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  Theatrical Roles: An Introduction to Theatre

  Gibson A. Cima

  Theatrical Roles: An Introduction to Theatre is an open educational resource (OER) created by Gibson Alessandro Cima for Introduction to Theatre at Northern Illinois University. Published through the Humanities LibreTexts platform under a Creative Commons CC BY 4.0 license, the textbook is designed as a free, accessible alternative to traditional introductory theatre textbooks.
  Rather than organizing theatre history around a conventional Western canon, the OER approaches theatre through the major collaborative roles involved in production: playwright, director, performer, designer/technician, and audience. The structure emphasizes theatre as a collective human practice rather than a linear history of great men and canonical texts.
  The book includes:
  • An introduction exploring what theatre is and why humans perform.
  • Units on the playwright, director, performer, and designers.
  • Contemporary case studies featuring working theatre artists and production processes.
  • Practical assignments that place students in creative production roles.
  • Discussion questions, learning checks, glossaries, references, and recommended resources.
  Theatrical Roles is explicitly decolonial and equity focused. The textbook critiques traditional theatre-history narratives centered on European and white male traditions and instead foregrounds global performance practices, collaborative creation, and inclusive teaching methods. The resource also uses active learning. Students create, perform, direct, design, and collaborate. Assignments culminate in practical production work, reflecting the text’s emphasis on embodied learning and ensemble-based practice.
  Because it is hosted on LibreTexts, the OER is modular, openly licensed, and adaptable for instructors. Faculty can remix, revise, or selectively assign chapters without requiring students to purchase a commercial textbook.

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  Fundamentals of Photography and Creative Practice

  Jessica Labatte and Larissa K. Garcia

  Photography has long been thought of as an accurate representation of the world. A tension, nonetheless, exists between photography as factual record and as constructed image. In this introductory digital photography text, students explore this tension by learning the basic functions of digital single-lens reflex (DSLR) cameras and how to use them to create photographic images.