Dr Grant Peterson - Dr. Grant Peterson has been appointed Honorary Senior Lecturer in Brunel's Arts & Humanities Department as of February 1, 2025. This position recognizes Dr. Peterson's contributions to teaching and administration and enables ongoing academic engagement with the university. This follows Dr. Peterson's relocation with his family to his home state of California, where he continues to publish research as an independent scholar and educator.
Dr. Peterson served many roles at Bruenl, starting in 2013, ranging from Programme Lead and Admissions Tutor to Associate Dean (Student Experience) for the College of Business, Arts, and Social Sciences (now College of Arts, Law and Social Sciences). His academic interests span British alternative theatre histories, interventionist street theatre, musical theatre studies, intersections of gender and sexuality, and pedagogy in the creative arts.
Dr. Peterson is an active researcher and supervisor, having guided postgraduate students in innovative areas of performance studies and politics. His current projects include a monograph contracted with Bloomsbury about interventionist street theatre practices in England and an journal article for Contemporary Theatre Review titled ‘AI Will Reprise Us: Performance and Recasting the Academy’ that explores impacts of artificial intelligence on theatre and academia. Recently, he was the first supervisor to Ariel Whitfield Sobel, whose thesis, ‘The Actor, The Audience, and The Spy: Tracing Actor Training Methodologies within Twentieth-Century Espionage Practice and Performance’, received the Vice Chancellor's Prize for Excellent Research. He has also co-authored articles with undergraduate students, including ‘Harmonising Neurodiversity in Musical Theatre Training: A Teacher-Student Dialogue’ for Theatre, Dance and Performance Training.
Dr. Peterson co-founded and led the development of Brunel University’s musical theatre subject strand and degree pathway courses, nurturing a dynamic curriculum that bridged performance, theory, and industry engagement. Graduates of the program have progressed to advanced training at leading institutions including the Royal Academy of Music, the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama, and the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland. Others have forged diverse careers across the performing arts industry—on professional stages and the West End, in national and international touring productions, in arts education, and in areas such as dramaturgy, casting, directing, and arts management. The pathway has also supported neurodiverse and interdisciplinary learners in identifying individual career routes, including applied theatre and community-based practice.
Prior to entering academia, Dr. Peterson enjoyed a two-decade career as a performer across theatre, musical theatre, television, and commercials in Southern California. His accolades include the Los Angeles Backstage Garland Award for Best Actor for his performance in the West Coast premiere of Dalton Trumbo’s Johnny Got His Gun (2003), which also received LA Weekly awards for Best Production. Dr. Peterson's autobiographical one-man show, Performing Cancer (2011–12), chronicled his experience with a rare stage IV cancer and his navigation of the healthcare systems in both the UK and US. The performance was featured at the Bath Fringe Festival and various academic conferences, illustrating how arts practice can serve as a powerful vehicle for exploring resilience and the lived experience of complex medical care.
Dr. Peterson’s teaching and research focus on:
Pedagogy, inclusion and the creative arts
British alternative theatre histories
Interventionist street theatre
Musical theatre studies
Performance and politics
Gender and sexuality
Digital humanities and AI