Home of Maeve Binchy, Samuel Beckett, James Joyce, Oscar Wilde, George Bernard Shaw, and a long list of other iconic dramatists, Dublin is a dream destination for those who wish to study theatre. The Department of Theatre Arts & Dance’s BA Dublin program provides a cohort of students with the opportunity to spend a semester immersing themselves in the artistic culture of the Irish capital. Three of those students share how this experience enhanced their on-campus coursework, helped them forge friendships, and expanded their theatrical horizons.
The Dublin study abroad program, offered by the department each spring semester, seemed like a perfect way to build on what the students had learned at the University. Julianna Bruemmer explains, “I had taken many classes that talked about influential works in theatre history and classes about different styles of acting and theatre, which provided good context going into this semester.” Stella Mehlhoff appreciated the change of pace provided by studying abroad. “I really wanted a challenge and I wanted a new perspective. I think when you're working in the same environment for too long, it can be easy to just get sort of stagnant.”
Bruemmer, Howatt, and Mehlhoff were part of a twelve-student BA Dublin program cohort that spent four months in Ireland and worked with program partner The Gaiety School of Acting. Students lived together as roommates, and Bruemmer says that they “connected more as a group because of our small number and close proximity.”
A major takeaway for Mehlhoff was the city’s profound love of theatre. “Dublin has been such a cool place to study theatre because literature and theatre are so alive in that city. I would go to a book launch and it would be so packed people would have to line up outside.” Dublin’s appreciation for the arts is incorporated into classes, too, with new plays frequently included in coursework. “It was really exciting to see how much people cared about the arts in Dublin,” Mehlhoff says. “And that inspired me to think about how we might build that kind of enthusiasm in the States as well.”
