The Department of Speech and Drama at Trinity University is a single administrative unit with two complementary, but relatively independent, academic programs, each with its own major and minor. Philosophically, the faculty and staff of the Department of Speech and Drama are strongly committed to an interrelated set of concerns consistent with our institutional roles and mission: We are collectively dedicated to the liberal arts and sciences mission of our university. We are primarily committed to teaching excellence for undergraduates, and this commitment is equal for all students, not simply our majors and minors. We are dedicated to scholarship and creative activities as they serve to enhance our teaching mission, aid our professional development, and project a positive image within higher education. We are further dedicated to the maximum provision of professional, university, and community service, insofar as they promote our instructional, scholarly and creative objectives, as well as good citizenship in our academic community. The realities of higher education also require us to compete for the best students, and activities such as debate and theatre provide an important part of our university’s recruitment effort.

Effective and creative expression of ideas is central not only to a liberal arts education, but to effective citizenship in our democratic system as well. Speech and Drama are among the oldest disciplines of study in Western civilization, and they now continue to embrace the effective and creative expression of our ideas in a diversity of situations. Through either discipline comes the opportunity to understand, to assess, and to perform the essential human activity of self expression. Those who study with us will, we believe, acquire the requisite intellectual background and essential artistic experience necessary to pursue careers and/or further study in a wide range of human endeavor and professional opportunity. Perhaps more importantly, we believe that they will better achieve the potential richness of a humane future.

As an academic discipline, Speech has a long and rich heritage in American universities. In the last two decades, Speech programs have experienced a remarkable growth indicative of the continuing relevance of personal communication studies to contemporary society. Trinity’s Speech program emphasizes the study of speech communication as a humane, artistic discipline grounded in personal choice. Students are challenged to study the history, theories, and research about human communication, and from these bases to develop skills in speech communication; in critical assessment of the rhetoric of others; and in analyzing communication problems and solutions in interpersonal, small group, organizational, pubic, and intercultural contexts.

Also rich in its heritage, the academic discipline of Drama reinforces the challenge for students to discover what it means to be human, including the realization of self-potential, the assumption of sound responsibilities, and the capability to make reasonable choices. Consistent with this general educational goal, our Drama program helps students to develop artistic discipline in acting, directing, and design for theatre; to enhance their historical and analytical skills through an appreciation of theatre history and dramatic literature; to acquire communication and organizational abilities through theatrical productions; to build respect for diversity in the collaborative process of making theatre; and, overall, to cultivate the ability to enhance the quality of one’s life.