Professor Helen Nicholson
BA PGCE PHD
Professor Helen Nicholson is Vice Principal (Research Impact and Interdisciplinarity) at Royal Holloway, University of London. Helen began her career as a teacher of English and Drama, and came to Homerton in 1992 as a senior lecturer in Drama where she lectured on the BEd, BA and PGCE courses. In 2000 she joined the department of Drama and Theatre at Royal Holloway, where she specialises in community-based theatre and contemporary performance.
Helen’s research interests are focused on contemporary theatre and applied performance, which means that she has worked in many different and sometimes rather unglamorous places – in schools, in care homes for the elderly, in day centres for people with head injuries, in prisons, in hostels for the homeless, in orphanages in Africa. Her research into theatre education raises fundamental questions, relevant to all forms of theatre, about how far innovative theatre and performance practices are compatible with learning, community engagement and civic participation. She has recently led the first major study of amateur theatre in the UK, and a multi-disciplinary research project on the arts in dementia care.
