Performance And The Politics Of Space

This collection asks what's at stake when a theatrical space is created and when a performance takes place: under what circumstances the topology of theatre becomes political. It visits a politics of inclusion and exclusion, of distributions and placements, and of spatial appropriation and utopian concepts in theatre history and contemporary performance.

Theatre's Heterotopias analyses performance space, using the concept of heterotopia: a location that, when apparent in performance, refers to the actual world, thus activating performance in its culture. Case studies cover site-specific and multimedia performance, and selected productions from the National Theatre of Scotland and the Globe Theatre.

From its very beginnings, theatre has been both an art and a public space, shared by actors and spectators. As a result, its entity and history is intimately tied to politics: a politics of inclusion and exclusion, of distributions and placements, of spatial appropriation and utopian concepts. This collection examines what is at stake when a theatrical space is created and when a performance takes place; it asks under what circumstances the topology of theatre becomes political. The book approaches this issue from various angles, taking theatre as a cultural paradigm for political dimensions of space in its respective historical context. Visiting the political dimensions of theatrical space in both theatre history and contemporary performance, the volume responds to the so-called spatial turn in cultural and historical studies, and questions a politics of aesthetics that is discussed in continental philosophy. The book visits different levels and linkages between aesthetic theory and geography, art and sociology, architecture and political theory, and geometry and history, shedding new light on theatre, politics, and space, thereby transforming this historically intertwined triad into a transdisciplinary theme.

The year 2007 saw the fiftieth anniversary of the Space Age, which began with the launching of Sputnik by the Soviet Union in October 1957. Space is crucial to the politics of the postmodern world. It has seen competition and cooperation in the past fifty years, and is in danger of becoming a battlefield in the next fifty. The International Politics of Space is the first book to bring these crucial themes together and provide a clear and vital picture of how politically important space has become, and what its exploitation might mean for all our futures. Michael Sheehan analyzes the space programmes of the United States, Russia, China, India and the European Space Agency, and explains how central space has become to issues of war and peace, international law, justice and international development, and cooperation between the worlds leading states. It highlights the significance of China and India’s commitment to space, and explains how the theories and concepts we use to describe and explain space are fundamental to the possibility of avoiding conflict in space in the future.

What might an analysis of politics which focuses on the operation of power through space and place, and on the spatial structuring of inequality, tell us about the world we make for ourselves and others? From the national border to the wire fence; from the privatisation of land to the exclusion and expulsion of persecuted peoples; questions of space and place, of who can be where and what they can do there, are at the very heart of the most important political debates of our time. Bringing together an interdisciplinary collection of authors deploying diverse perspectives and methodological approaches, this book responds to the pressing demand to reflect on and engage with some of the key questions raised by a political analysis of space and place. Its chapters chart the ways in which inequality and exclusion are played out in spatial terms, exploring the operations of power and resistance at the micro-level of the individual home and small community, analysing modes of securitisation and fortification utilised in the interests of wealth and power, and documenting the ways in which space and place are being transformed by changing socio-economic and cultural demands. As well as analysing the ways in which forms of exclusion and persecution are manifest spatially, the chapters in this book also attend to the forms of resistance and contestation which emerge in response to them. Resistance is found in the persistence of those who build and rebuild their homes and communities in a world which seems bent on their exclusion. At the same time life on the peripheries can give rise to new conceptions of citizenship and public space as well as to new political demands which seek to (re)claim space and contest the dominant order. Bringing together scholars working in fields as diverse as political science, geography, international studies, cultural anthropology, architecture, political philosophy and the visual arts, this book offers readers access to a range of contemporary case studies and theoretical perspectives. Relevant, timely and thoroughly accessible, this text offers an integrated approach to what can be a dauntingly diverse area of study and will be of interest not only to those working in fields such as architecture, political theory and geography but also to non-specialists and students.

Jay Pather, Performance and Spatial Politics in South Africa offers the first full-length monograph on the award-winning choreographer, theater director, curator, and creative artist in contemporary global performance. Working within the contexts of African studies, dance, theater, and performance, Ketu H. Katrak explores the extent of Pather's productive career but also places him and his work in the South African and global arts scene, where he is considered a visionary. Pather, a South African of Indian heritage, is known as a master of space, site, and location. Katrak examines how Pather's performance practices place him in the center of global trends that are interdisciplinary, multidisciplinary, collaborative, and multimedia and that cross borders between dance, theater, visual art, and technology. Jay Pather, Performance and Spatial Politics in South Africa offers a vision of an artist who is strategically aware of the spatiality of human life, who understands the human body as the nation's collective history, and who is a symbol of hope and resilience after the trauma of violent segregation.

This innovative book sets out to question what we understand by the term new social movements'. By examining a range of issues associated with identity politics and alternative lifestyles, the author challenges those who treat new social movements as instances of wider social change while often ignoring their more local' and dispersed' importance. This book questions what it means to adopt an identity that is organised around issues of expressivism - and offers a series of non-reductionist ways of looking at identity politics. Hetherington analyzes expressive identities through issues of performance, spaces of identity and the occasion'. This important work shows how the significance of identity politics are at once local, plural, situated and topologically complex.

Space: it's everywhere, all around, a given. It's abstract and yet not abstract at all, because it governs all human relations, shapes the way we understand our place on the planet, and orients us toward others (for better and for worse). How do theatre scholars understand space and place in performance? What tools do they use to theorize the political work space does on – and beyond – the stage? How can students use these tools to unpack the workings of space and place in the performances they see, the plays they study, and the experiences they have outside their classrooms? Theory for Theatre Studies: Space provides a comprehensive introduction to the 'spatial turn' in modern theatre and performance theory, exploring topics as diverse as embodied space, environmental performance politics and urban performance studies. The book is written in accessible prose and features in-depth case studies of Platform's audio walk And While London Burns, Katie Mitchell's Fraülein Julie, Young Jean Lee's The Shipment, and Evalyn Parry and Laakkuluk Williamson Bathory's Kiinalik: These Sharp Tools. TfTS: Space begins with fresh readings of historical dramatic theory, discusses twentieth-century theoretical trends at length, and ends by asking what it will take (and what work is already underway) to decolonize the Western, settler-colonial stage. Online resources to accompany this book are available at: www.bloomsbury.com/uk/theory-for-theatre-studies-space-9781350006072/