Advance Diploma in Arts (Acting), The Australian Academy of Dramatic Art, Sydney Graduate Certificate (PA), The Atlantic Theater Company Acting School, New York Bachelor of Performance, The Australian Academy of Dramatic Art, Sydney PhD, Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts (WAAPA), Edith Cowan University New Zealand Certificate in Adult and Tertiary Teaching Ara Institute of Canterbury, Christchurch, NZ Dr Soseh Yekanians is a graduate from the Australian Academy of Dramatic Art in Sydney and The Atlantic Theater Company Acting School in New York. In 2012, she was awarded an Australian Postgraduate Award Scholarship to embark on a Doctorate of Philosophy (PhD) at the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts (WAAPA) in Perth. Her practice-led research titled, Finding Identity through Directing, investigated how theatre directing and the performing arts could provide a culturally displaced individual with a sense of identity and belonging. Her practice-led study specifically provided new insights into how theatre directing allows an individual to (re)discover their identity through leadership in a non-judgmental forum and how the theatre as a space for communal exchanges and conversations can initiate dialogue about cultural differences. Following her doctorate, a major career highlight for Soseh has been the publication of her children’s literature book, The Special Team Elite. Inspired by her own upbringing, the story follows a young girl who is faced with the struggles of loving her individual qualities or conforming to the pressures placed upon her by others. The question for her is: what is the “ideal norm”? Her monograph Finding Identity through Directing is also available through Routledge Publishers. Having started her career in theatre at aged six, over the years whilst following her various creative endeavours, Soseh has primarily developed a strong teaching base working as an acting teacher, director and theatre educator for performing arts institutions and elite talent agencies both in Australia and overseas. Soseh lectures within the School of Social Work and Arts and teachers subjects in Theatre, Production and Performing Arts. As a researcher-director, Soseh is fascinated with the idea of ‘performing belonging and identity on stage’ and therefore, is interested in how performance as a cultural phenomenon can help break down harmful stereotypes and through the transparency of theatre, offer cross-cultural exchange that develop and empower an individual’s sense of (re)discovery of identity. During her doctorate, her research focused on understandings of 'Self' and identity formation with specific reference to theatre and directing, with a keen interest in how cultural stereotypes manifested in individuals through the pressures of society and how these stereotypes were/are performed via theatrical representations onstage. As a Persian-Armenian-Australian who has personally experienced cultural displacement Soseh is fascinated with how theatre and art more generally speaks to this sense of (dis)location. Through the performing arts how might individuals (re)discover their sense of belonging and home? Moreover, looking towards the future, especially through globalization, the speed of information and technology enabling the collapse of national borders/boundaries and the embracing of 'multiculturalism', the potential for breaking down these discrimination margins becomes possible and if so, what role does theatre and performance play?
Course Directors
Dr Soseh Yekanians
Course Director of the Bachelor of Arts (with Specialisations) / Senior Lecturer in Performing Arts
Bathurst
Building 1435, Room 109
Professional Memberships