Debra Bruch

Biography

Dr. Bruch is an Associate Professor of Theatre in the Department of Visual and Performing Arts. She received her B.S.Ed. degree in Theatre and Speech from Northwest Missouri State University, her M.A. degree in Theatre from the University of Missouri – Kansas City, and her Ph.D. degree in Theatre with an emphasis in theatre history and theory and criticism from the University of Missouri – Columbia.

Dr. Bruch has an active record of artistic and scholarly achievement and has served the MTU mission by contributing to Michigan Tech's national and international presence. She has been active in the Association for Theatre in Higher Education, the national theatre association for the academe, especially with the Religion and Theatre Focus Group. She was on R&T's executive council for several years and began their first email listserve and website that was housed here at MTU, was conference planner, and chair/focus group representative. Through ATHE, she was the founding editor for the peer-reviewed journal, The Journal of Religion and Theatre , and was the general editor from 2002 to January 2008. She is interested in the relationship between Australian culture and Australian drama, and has published and presented papers which explore Australian Aboriginal drama. In January, 2007, she traveled to Iran to attend the International Seminar on Religion and Drama on merit of her article about Jack Davis' The Dreamers . She is working on a book manuscript, Australian Aboriginal Drama: From Fracture to Restoration through The Dreaming . Debra also served as an adjudicator for the Kennedy Center/American College Theatre Festival for several years. She has been included in Who's Who of America's Teachers and Who's Who of American Women .

She has been writing plays since 1973. In the 1980's, some of her work such as Times Are Changin' and Damon's Cage were produced by universities. A one-act play, A Ringing in My Ears , was produced and then published in Bert's Play It Again!: More One-Act Plays for Acting Students . This play has been produced both inside and outside the United States. In 1996, her monologue, Pioneer Woman , won a national competition and received an Equity production by Studio Z on "The Monologue Show" in Chicago. Debra also chaired a national playwriting competition for ATHE during the 1990's.

Dr. Bruch also has been an active director during her tenure at Michigan Technological University. She has directed such plays as Macbeth , Taming of the Shrew, The Odd Couple, A Midsummer Night's Dream, A Moon for the Misbegotten , and The Mousetrap . Debra also is keenly interested in peace and justice issues, and created a narrative video titled "Quest for Peace: Images in Snow" which was presented at the International Women's Conference on peace in June, 1993. Besides the rehearsal hall, Debra's teachings have been in theatre history, dramatic literature, script analysis, theatre appreciation type of courses, world cultures, perspectives, and speech communication. She has begun a class on creating story in role playing games.