OH MY GOD

[cdd]

http://www.manchester.ac.uk/medialibrar ... on2007.pdf This is the course he is apparently doing. Looks awfully wishy-washy to me. Defintely a close run thing between that lot and the Art students. Also for a course that's something to do with communication:

GCSE requirements
English Language at minimum grade C.

[Sput]

Yes, but what a fine institution

[Jamez]

I'm surprised he's gone to Manchester. Royalty like Hanson tend to stay south of the "peasant line" which is an imaginary line which runs from Worcester to Ipswich and then another line which they tend to stay North of - it's called the Scottish border - but that's only during summer months and only if you have half a million acres to yourself.

[Sput]

My money would have been on Bristol, but good on him for sticking with the grit of the North. I wonder what wisdom he can impart to the TK Max-crowding scum.

[Nick Harvey]

the "peasant line" which is an imaginary line which runs from Worcester to Ipswich

You fail to mention what happens west of Worcester.

Does it change to running North-South and, possibly, follow Mr Offa's little dyke?

[cdd]

Yes, but what a fine institution

Don't doubt it for a minute, but all institutions have courses to cater to the sleazy more-money-than-sense crowd.

The rough pecking order IMO:

• Science/maths students
• Humanity students
• "Social Science" students
• Arts students

[James H]

I'm not happy with being at the bottom of the pecking order cdd. Arts Ed, for example, has a 1:45 ratio of people who get in to people who audition. More exclusive than Manchester, who clearly let any old riff raff in. Including an ex girlfriend of mine. Would have sent her packing to Hull if I could.

[cdd]

But is it academic? I love the arts, but I think universities should accept it as something different ("natural"/"organic") rather than (from what I've seen) finding all manner of excuses to try and pas it off as something "precise". I was actaully referring to design courses more than theatre, but which are the worst offenders, but the whole spectrum IMO...

[James H]

I think they're vocational courses which definitely are academic - for example, I did AS Level performance studies and studied Brecht and Gerswhin very closely. I had a written exam to do on Brecht and Gerswhin as well as a practical side - the whole of which I thoroughly enjoyed. I do think the courses are academic but I think it's peoples' perceptions of the courses that let them down. Musical Theatre is intensely hard and amazingly select, but they all end up with jobs in the industry somewhere. Yet we send thousands of kids off to med school every year, so why do we still suffer from a shortage of doctors?

[cdd]

I think they're vocational courses which definitely are academic - for example, I did AS Level performance studies and studied Brecht and Gerswhin very closely.

But there, you leave art and start studing something that is closer to, say, science or history. The reason I view the studying of the art itself as non-academic (and instead as the new and distinct category of "art") is because you are studying constructs. That's not to say I don't enjoy scientificising art - the Music Genome project is fascinating, for example - but surely the enjoyment (or consumption) of art is an emotional rather than an intellectual sensation. And I don't have a problem with art schools or students as long as they don't go in under that pretence.

[Gavin Scott]

But is it academic? I love the arts, but I think universities should accept it as something different ("natural"/"organic") rather than (from what I've seen) finding all manner of excuses to try and pas it off as something "precise". I was actaully referring to design courses more than theatre, but which are the worst offenders, but the whole spectrum IMO...

The "organic" is what the performer brings to the process. A degree course focuses on a spread of disciplines, including textual studies and phonetics. Acting classes, per se, take up very little space on the timetable.

Drama degrees from accredited establishments are highly regarded and very difficult to get in to.

I understand why you might feel "art" is something intangible or purely interpretative - but having done the degree myself I assure you the learning process is no different from the sciences. And the hours are longer.

The lack of a "right or wrong" answer does not invalidate the search to find it. Literature and text is hard work, young man.