The Multicultural Theater Practice Certificate is available to any Five College student, regardless of their designated major. The Certificate Program draws upon the unique resources of the University of Massachusetts Amherst and the Five College academic community to offer a groundbreaking course of study at the intersection of theory and practice. The Multicultural Theater Practice Certificate is rooted in the nationally recognized work of New WORLD Theater in forging new performances and defining new aesthetics by artists of color. It is supported by its host, the Department of Theater, through its excellence in training artists in the wide-ranging tools of the craft. It is enriched by the   interdisciplinary dialogue made possible by many other programs, classes, and professors whose work intersects with this course of study.

Since 1979 New WORLD has existed in both the academic and the performing arts worlds, articulating a definition of multiculturalism rooted in student activism, coalition building, and the creation of a diverse body of works for students as well as audience members. It has provided a place where scholars and artists come together, find able technical and administrative support, and make multicultural theater .

The urge to codify this intersection and teach it to subsequent generations of scholars,artists, technicians and administrators is the goal of the Multicultural Theater Practice certificate program.For more than twenty years now members of New WORLD Theater staff have taught classes in the Department of Theater , which has provided a site for this engaged pedagogy while providing students with a notion of history, representation, and creative processes of people of color as well as a cultural context within which multicultural theater is produced in this country. Some of these courses are now institutionalized into the Department of Theater's curriculum and taught every semester, forming a core sequence of classes that serves a bridge between New WORLD Theater and the department.

The Multicultural Theater Practice Certificate builds from this bridge to further explore, examine, contest, and define ways in which the American theater canon is one that still is predicated on particular sociopolitical realities that circumscribe the roles of artists of color. Additionally, central to program objectives is the notion that the future of theater is yet to be determined, and this ambiguity is linked to the shifting purchase power and currency of terms like multiculturalism and diversity. It extends the dialogue to new horizons by imagining the future of the arts not just in this country but around the world as we explore international and intercultural perspectives. At the same time the creation of the Multicultural Theater Practice Certificate validates and affirms a way of working while providing an academic locus for the evolving discourse around multiculturalism, future aesthetics and performance.

The Multicultural Theater Practice Certificate is a series of classes (core and elective) that would result in a certificate supplemental to an undergraduate student's declared major. Long-term goals for the program include developing a graduate certificate and establishing a TA-ship for a graduate student who would assist in teaching the core courses.

By moving through this core curriculum, students will be exposed to the political andhistorical roots of multicultural theater. They will learn about the complexities of the language of multiculturalism, the cultural contexts from which the creative works of artists of color emerge, the social and political nature of multicultural theater, and the practical applications of the discourse of multicultural theater. At all stages in the curriculum, students will be asked to consider the political implications of the work and its relationship to social activism. Finally, throughout the core curriculum, students will look at the discourse of multiculturalism by tracing the problematic nature of another label, always posing the questions, "What is multiculturalism?" and "What is multicultural theater?"

Core Courses
The three core courses of the Multicultural Theater Practice Certificate work together as a series. They are designed for students to move through sequentially, from introductory level to intermediate to advanced.

Theater 130: Contemporary Playwrights of Color (ALD)
This general education course provides a broad introduction to the concepts of multiculturalism in theater and an overview of the social and political contexts for the creative works of writers of color active today in this country. Students read plays, along with selected readings that ground the coursework in time and place and provide a critical framework for discussion. Students also attend theater productions, guest lectures and workshops, as well as writing essays and creating group projects. While this general education overview introduces students to writers who fit into identity categories of African American, Asian American, Latino and Native American, it also points out the complexities and diversity within each grouping, and questions the limitations of labels.

Theater 397: Special Topics in Multicultural Theater History and Repertory
This upper-level course, capped at 25, provides students with an in-depth look at the history and repertory of multicultural and world theater by focusing on a specific tradition, community, or identity. Students read plays, along with selected readings that provide a critical framework for discussion. Students also attend theater productions, guest lectures and workshops, and write extended in-depth analyses. Topics may change from semester to semester depending on instructor.

Theater 597: Multicultural Theater Practice
This seminar-style course provides a capstone experience for students to put their understanding of multicultural theater into practice. It does so by exploring contemporary critical theory and related issues facing the field today, while asking students to undertake large-scale projects and practica in conjunction with the New WORLD Theater season, archives, and programming.Through this capstone-style course, students will experience the inter-relationship of theory and practice even as they become engaged in making the multicultural theater of the future.