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The word '''drama''' has three general uses in English (and in [[Afrikaans]]), namely (a) to refer to a specific work of dramatic or theatrical art  (a drama = a play), (b) as a collective term for a whole body of work written for the theatre (e.g. English drama, [[Afrikaans]] drama or [[Xhosa]] drama), or to refer to any situation in which there is "dramatic" conflict (e.g in "There was drama in court when the witness testified..").  

It is in these terms that the concepts of [[Drama Studies]] (and [[Drama Departments]] and Literature Departments at school and university) originally evolved over the century and plied their trade. 

More recently it has become usage to utilize the term in its narrower literary sense when referring to the body of written and printed [[Text|texts]] (and indeed the term [[Text|text]] is often used as an equivalent of [[Drama|drama]], particularly of unpublished or draft works). However, in this interpretation a [[Drama|drama]] is not seen as a general equivalent for [[Theatre|theatre]] ([[Toneel|toneel]] or [[Teater|teater]] in [[Afrikaans]]),  or for what has more recently become known as [[Performance]] or the [[Theatrical Event]]. Thus, in more recent writing , the phrase "English drama in South Africa" would normally refer to the [[Text|texts]] (written, printed)  of plays ''written in English'' in South Africa, not necessarily to the performance of such plays or English works by non South African playwrights in the country. (The latter would be possibly be considered under the rubric "[[English '''theatre]]''' in South Africa]]"). 

However this distinction is quite arbitrary, and not really consistently applied, even today. ''Vide'' for example the books by  [[Martin Orkin]] (''Drama and the South African State'', 1991) and [[Loren Kruger]] (''The Drama of South Africa]], 1999), where Orkin for the most part does restrict himself to the printed texts, but Kruger most certainly does not (in a way thus suggesting she is playing with the built in ambiguity of the word, as outlined above). In contrast see for example  [[Temple Hauptfleisch]] and [[Ian Steadman]] (''South African Theatre: Four Plays and an Introduction'', 1984), [[David Coplan]] (''In Township Tonight! South Africa's Black City Music and Theatre'', 1985), [[Robert Kavanagh]] (''Theatre and Cultural Struggle in South Africa'', 1985), [[Temple Hauptfleisch]] (''Theatre and Society in South Africa'', 1999) In all these cases written and printed texts, as well as unscripted or unpublished performances are discussed. 


See also [[Theatre]], [[Play]], [[Text]], [[Performance]].

== Sources ==

See further [[South African Theatre/Bibliography]]

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