Rate My Professor Jon Burtt

Jon Burtt is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Humanities at Macquarie University in Sydney, where he serves as Course Director of the Master of Creative Industries. A performer, director, teacher, and scholar working in the creative industries, Burtt began his career creating and directing interdisciplinary performance works that achieved critical and public success and toured extensively across Australia and Asia. His academic background includes a Master’s thesis based on fieldwork in India investigating the ancient yogic practice of rope and pole Mallakhamb, and a PhD from Edith Cowan University’s Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts (WAAPA) focused on new cognitive approaches to physical training, conducted during his tenure as Researcher-in-Residence at the National Circus School in Montreal. He currently holds a Research Associate position with HUPR, the Research Centre for Human Potential in Montreal.

Burtt’s research specializations encompass circus studies, social circus, circus training, and creative industries, with publications appearing in journals such as New Theatre Quarterly, Theatre, Dance and Performance Training, and the Journal of Arts and Communities. Key publications include the co-edited volume Contemporary Circus (Routledge, 2019; Chinese translation 2021, forthcoming Korean translation 2025 and second English edition 2026), Circus for Social Change: Social Circus in Context (Routledge, 2025; co-authored with Katie Lavers and Emmanuel Bochud), and articles such as “Cirqiniq: the decolonising of social circus in Nunavik” (Theatre, Dance and Performance Training, 2022; with Lavers and Bochud), “Phia Ménard: the body of contestation” (European Journal of Theatre and Performance, 2022; with Lavers and Louis Patrick Leroux), and “‘Shoulder to Shoulder: Sweat and Joy’ – training with Gravity and Other Myths” (Theatre, Dance and Performance Training, 2021; with Lavers and Lachlan Binns). His teaching excellence has been honored with the Macquarie University Vice-Chancellor’s Citation for Outstanding Contribution to Student Learning (2016) and an Advance Higher Education Academy Fellowship (2020). Burtt also serves as editor for the journal CALS (Circus Arts, Life and Sciences), contributing significantly to the international discourse on contemporary circus pedagogy and performance practices.