Walker Library: Dramaturgy: Play Setting

Play Setting

The setting of the play includes specific information about the environment in which the action takes place, what has happened before the play begins, and the attitudes of characters toward the world of the play. When researching the play setting, look for information about:

Economic Environment: class, wealth, and poverty
Political Environment: relationship of the characters to the form of government they live under
Social Environment: values and social institutions under which the characters live
Cultural Environment: arts, architecture, sports, fashion, and popular culture
Historical Environment: contemporary or historical events

Selected Books about Pop Culture and Daily Life

Daily Life Through History series
Approximately 45 books about daily life in various time periods and places
American Popular Culture Through History series
Ten books on American popular culture in different time periods
American Decades series
Key historical and social events and primary sources in the United States, 1900-2009

Try a keyword search in the Library Catalog, using terms such as social conditions, social life, customs, or daily life. Combine one of these terms with words describing the geographic and/or historical setting of the play. Example for Vaclav Havel's Temptation: Czechoslovakia AND Cold War AND Social Conditions.

Selected Historical Newspaper Databases

Consult the Newspapers Research Guide for a comprehensive list of historical newspaper databases.

Newspapers.com Library Edition This link opens in a new window
Access to 4,000+ historical newspapers dating from the early 1700s into the 2000s. Contains full runs and portions of runs of well-known, regional and state titles to small local newspapers in the United States and other countries.
Newspapers.com LibGuide (support and training)
Title List (World Collection(Excel)
Title List (Southeast Collection(Excel)
Eight Centuries (formerly 19th Century Masterfile) This link opens in a new window
Database covering Anglo-American primary source material dating from 1106 until 1960, aggregating indexes, catalogs, collections, and other finding aids. Provides access to articles, newspapers, books, U.S. patents, government documents, and images, with links to full-text where available.
8C includes Poole's Index to Periodical Literature; Niles' Register; American Memory; links to images in ArtSTOR; plus many more. See full content list (click on Resource Descriptions)
African American Newspapers (Accessible Archives) This link opens in a new window
19th century African American newspapers in full-text searchable form with page images.
Titles in Collection:
The Christian Recorder
The Colored American/Weekly Advocate
Frederick Douglass' Paper
Freedom's Journal
The National Era
The North Star
Provincial Freeman
Historical Chicago Defender This link opens in a new window
Fulltext digital archive of the Chicago Defender newspaper, 1900-1975.
Historical Nashville Tennessean This link opens in a new window
Fulltext digital archive of The Nashville Tennessean newspaper, 1812-2002.
Historical New York Times This link opens in a new window
Full text digital archive of The New York Times, 1851-2018
Times (London) Digital Archive, 1785-2010 This link opens in a new window
Every complete page of every issue in full-text searchable format.

Afro-American Newspaper Archives
This collection of historic African-American newspapers will be expanded over time. Coverage is primarily 20th century.
Chronicling America
View content from historic newspapers pages from 1777-1963 or use the U.S. Newspaper Directory to find information about American newspapers published between 1690-present.
Google Newspaper Archive
Digital scans of historical newspapers from around the world.

Timelines, Chronologies and Landmark Events

Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History
Story of art and global culture told through the Metropolitan Museum of Art's collection. Pairs essays and works of art with chronologies of major events.
World Book (Encyclopedia) Timelines
More than 400 timelines for various places in the world along with literature, arts, sports, science and technology and notable people.
Landmark Events from World News Digest
News stories on landmark events from the 1940s to present

Music and Popular Culture

Music Industry Data (Music ID): Formerly Academic Charts Online This link opens in a new window
Within MusicID, MusicID Data and Music ID Impact provide information about contemporary popular music in the 20th and 21st centuries.
Music ID contains popular music chart data from around the world, including the US, UK, Europe, South America, and Asia. It delivers access to chart data from Billboard, Official Chart Company, IFPI, Media Control, ARIA and more. Includes archival data. Updated weekly.
Read more about Music ID.
Music ID contents information
How to Use Music ID

The Center for Popular Music
The Center for Popular Music is a research center and archive here on MTSU's campus containing primary source materials related to American popular/vernacular music from the 18th Century to the present.
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The Center for Popular Music at Middle Tennessee State University is one of the world's oldest and largest research centers devoted to the study of American folk and popular music. Established in 1985 as a state-sponsored Center for Excellence, in 2009 it became a unit in the university's College of Media and Entertainment.
Cash Box Magazine Charts Archive
Weekly music charts listing the best selling singles for Pop, Country, and R&B/Soul from the late 1940s through the 1990s.
Billboard (1936 to present) (from Entertainment Industry Magazine Archive)
Billboard published its first music hit parade on Jan. 4, 1936. Digital full-text available through the library 1894-2000.
Billboard (Google Books)
Scans of selected Billboard magazines from the 1940s through 2010.

Rock's Backpages This link opens in a new window
Classic articles and audio interviews on popular music dating to the 1950's. Choose a link from "Site Content" on the left to get started.
Subscribe to the weekly newsletter for information on new content.

Life Magazine
Digital version of all issues of LIFE magazine from 1935-1970. An invaluable resource for studying American culture during this time period.

Victorian Popular Culture This link opens in a new window
Resource for the study of popular entertainment in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.
Four sections:
* Moving Pictures, Optical Entertainments and the Advent of Cinema
* Music Hall, Theatre and Popular Entertainment
* Circuses, Sideshows and Freaks
* Spiritualism, Sensation and Magic
See Nature and Scope for more information.
Rock and Roll, Counterculture, Peace and Protest This link opens in a new window
Historical documents covering popular culture in Britain and America, 1950-1975.
Key issues and events covered include:

Changing Lifestyles, 1950-1975
Youth Culture
Student Protests across Europe and the US
Mai ‘68
Popular Culture; TV; Music; Movies
Book, Magazine and Film Censorship
Civil Rights; Women’s Liberation; Minority Groups
The Space Race
Consumerism; Credit Cards; Computers
The Vietnam conflict
Nuclear Disarmament

The collection includes:

A wide range of Printed and Manuscript material - pamphlets, letters, government files, and eye witness accounts covering key events of the period
The renowned Social Protest Collection from University of California, Berkeley
A wide range of Underground magazines including OZ and IT; as well as an impressive collection of American fanzines and alternative press titles from Bowling Green State University
Striking visual material - thousands of indexed photographs depicting the people and events of the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s
Ephemera and Memorabilia - posters, pins and artefacts
Video - a collection of carefully selected video footage that brings the sights and sounds of the period to life!

World Culture and History

AtoZ the World This link opens in a new window
Country guides for 174 countries, covering culture, history, travel, business, and more.
See product brochure (PDF) for more content information.

CIA World Fact Book

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Dramaturgy