Theater Educator
Meron Langsner, MA, MFA, PhD is an award-winning educator available for workshops and guest lectures in a wide range of subject areas in the Greater New York Area.
Please contact him to make arrangements.
Please contact him to make arrangements.
Teaching Competencies
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Academic: Theatre History, Dramatic Literature & Criticism, Performance Studies, Dance and Movement Ethnography, Popular Entertainment, Film Studies
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Studio: Playwriting & Dramaturgy, Stage Combat, Acting, Directing, Movement, Devised Work, Creative Writing
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Teaching Awards
Award for Outstanding Contributions to Undergraduate Education - Tufts University Graduate School of Arts and Sciences
Osher Scholar - CELT (Center for the Enhancement of Learning and Teaching), Tufts University
Citations for Major Positive Impact on the Tufts Undergraduate Experience, Tufts Senior Survey 2008, 2009, & 2011.
Nominated for Tufts Graduate Student Council Outstanding Graduate Student Mentoring and Contribution to Undergraduate Education award in 2008
2018 Commencement Keynote Speaker - Tom Todoroff Studio Conservatory, NYC
Selected Experience
Instructor at: Boston University, Emerson College, New York Film Academy Summer Institute at Harvard, The Tom Todoroff Acting Conservatory (NYC), Tufts University (Department of Drama & Dance and Osher LLI), and Prescott College on subjects that included: World Theatre History, Playwriting, Stage Combat, Acting, Dramaturgy, Movement, Improvisation, Theatre Appreciation, Violence in Shakespeare & Contemporary Plays.
Guest Lecturer/Workshop Leader for: New York Summer Sling, Massachusetts Educational Theatre Guild, Lyric First Stage, New Repertory Theatre, Bank of America PIC Interns, Yellow Taxi Productions, Cabinet Gallery, Salve Regina University, New England Institute of Art, Eastern CT University, Manhattanville College, TEX: Tufts Idea Exchange (alumni speaker), Citizen Schools, MAPHERD, PAVE (Peers Against ViolencE), StageSource, Region I KC/ACTF, ATHE, Last Frontier Theatre Conference (featured artist), Pla Pla Pla Playwrights (Rio de Janeiro), Weston Drama Workshop, and other organizations on a wide variety of subjects, both scholarly and studio related.
Served as a teaching assistant for courses on directing, screenwriting, Shakespeare on Film, advanced acting, and stage combat at Tufts, Brandeis, and SUNY Buffalo. Assisted such luminaries as Kazimierz Braun and Stephen McKinley Henderson.
Meron has judged for several METG (Massachusetts Educational Theatre Guild) Festivals, as well as for the August Wilson Monologue Competition.
He is also an accomplished Fight Director/Movement Specialist and Stage Director, and has served in those capacities in numerous academic venues.
Links to Selected Pedagogy Articles:
"The Cinematographer Exercise - Introducing Non-Contact Blows" - Pedagogy article in The Cutting Edge: The Newsletter of the Society of American Fight Directors
"Teaching 'Writing the Fight' at Region I KC/ACTF" - Scan of an article from The Cutting Edge: Newsletter of the Society of American Fight Directors
"Towards a Dramaturgy of Stage Combat" - This article appeared in both The Fight Master: The Journal of the Society of American Fight Directors and Volume 4 of the LMDA Dramaturgy Sourcebook
Statement of Teaching Philosophy
A teacher’s job is threefold; the first and simplest task is to transmit knowledge and skills, the second is to coach the application and development of what has been taught, and the third is to create the forum in which that learning can be applied beyond its original context.
This last element is most important for those of us who teach theatre arts and performance studies. Theatre is simultaneously practical and intellectual, visceral and abstract, historical and theoretical. The best theatre practitioners are those who have an understanding of their collaborators’ functions as well as competence in their own specialty. My pedagogy addresses the collaborative nature of our profession, regardless of which discipline I am teaching.
As a teacher I strive to create a specific understanding of whatever elements constitute any given course while also teaching where those same element exist in a larger context. To this end I have assigned dramaturgy papers in stage combat courses, analyses of business structures in theatre appreciation courses, and casting exercises in theatre history classes.
Ideally my classroom is an adaptive system that can take advantage of variables such as ongoing productions within reach of the students, different student experiences and backgrounds within a class, new technologies, and current events when appropriate. There is delicate balancing act wherein adaptations must not come at the expense of course content, but I have learned that it is possible to create a classroom in which I learn from my students as they learn from one another.
The assignments and discussions that arise as a result of this philosophy are empowering for the students while continuously engaging them- and me. I encourage them to see themselves as emerging professionals in a multifaceted field. As I respond to the insight of my broad-minded students, no lesson is lost. Whether the next class I teach is history, playwriting, performance studies, stage combat, or anything else, I strive to apply those lessons of each class to the benefit of the next one.