Bryce Lease
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- January 2017
- ISBN:
- 9781784992958
- eISBN:
- 9781526115263
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Manchester University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7228/manchester/9781784992958.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, Criticism/Theory
This monograph takes as its subject the dynamic new range of performance practices that have been developed since the demise of communism in the flourishing theatrical landscape of Poland. After ...
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This monograph takes as its subject the dynamic new range of performance practices that have been developed since the demise of communism in the flourishing theatrical landscape of Poland. After 1989, Lease argues, the theatre has retained its historical role as the crucial space for debating and interrogating cultural and political identities. Providing access to scholarship and criticism not readily accessible to an English-speaking readership, this study surveys the rebirth of the theatre as a site of public intervention and social criticism since the establishment of democracy and the proliferation of theatre makers that have flaunted cultural commonplaces and begged new questions of Polish culture. Lease suggests that a radical democratic pluralism is only tenable through the destabilization of attempts to essentialize Polish national identity, focusing on the development of new theatre practices that interrogate the rise of nationalism, alternative sexual identities and forms of kinship, gender equality, contested histories of antisemitism, and postcolonial encounters. Lease elaborates a new theory of political theatre as part of the public sphere. The main contention is that the most significant change in performance practice after 1989 has been from opposition to the state to a more pluralistic practice that engages with marginalized identities purposefully left out of the rhetoric of freedom and independence.Less
This monograph takes as its subject the dynamic new range of performance practices that have been developed since the demise of communism in the flourishing theatrical landscape of Poland. After 1989, Lease argues, the theatre has retained its historical role as the crucial space for debating and interrogating cultural and political identities. Providing access to scholarship and criticism not readily accessible to an English-speaking readership, this study surveys the rebirth of the theatre as a site of public intervention and social criticism since the establishment of democracy and the proliferation of theatre makers that have flaunted cultural commonplaces and begged new questions of Polish culture. Lease suggests that a radical democratic pluralism is only tenable through the destabilization of attempts to essentialize Polish national identity, focusing on the development of new theatre practices that interrogate the rise of nationalism, alternative sexual identities and forms of kinship, gender equality, contested histories of antisemitism, and postcolonial encounters. Lease elaborates a new theory of political theatre as part of the public sphere. The main contention is that the most significant change in performance practice after 1989 has been from opposition to the state to a more pluralistic practice that engages with marginalized identities purposefully left out of the rhetoric of freedom and independence.
Naomi Paxton
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- January 2019
- ISBN:
- 9781526114785
- eISBN:
- 9781526139054
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Manchester University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7228/manchester/9781526114785.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, Drama
This book provides the first detailed account of the work of the Actresses' Franchise League, taking the story of the organisation further than ever before. Formulated as a historiographically ...
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This book provides the first detailed account of the work of the Actresses' Franchise League, taking the story of the organisation further than ever before. Formulated as a historiographically innovative critical biography of the League over the fifty years of the organisation’s activities, this book invites a total reassessment of the League within both 20th Century industry networks and accepted narratives of the development of political theatre in the UK. Making a genuine contribution to both theatre and suffrage histories, this book looks in detail at the performative propaganda of the suffrage movement and the role of feminist actresses as activists during and after the campaign for Votes for Women. It explores the extensive networks of political and theatrical activism and social campaigning through which suffragist performers, playwrights and producers shaped their careers, and reveals how determined the Actresses' Franchise League was to be visible in public space, and to create equal opportunities for women in the theatre industry. Drawing on archival material, this book shows how members and allies of the League addressed a broad range of political and social issues through their work, how they presented and represented women and womanhood, and how the organisation, formed and embedded in the Edwardian period, diversified during and after the First and Second World Wars.Less
This book provides the first detailed account of the work of the Actresses' Franchise League, taking the story of the organisation further than ever before. Formulated as a historiographically innovative critical biography of the League over the fifty years of the organisation’s activities, this book invites a total reassessment of the League within both 20th Century industry networks and accepted narratives of the development of political theatre in the UK. Making a genuine contribution to both theatre and suffrage histories, this book looks in detail at the performative propaganda of the suffrage movement and the role of feminist actresses as activists during and after the campaign for Votes for Women. It explores the extensive networks of political and theatrical activism and social campaigning through which suffragist performers, playwrights and producers shaped their careers, and reveals how determined the Actresses' Franchise League was to be visible in public space, and to create equal opportunities for women in the theatre industry. Drawing on archival material, this book shows how members and allies of the League addressed a broad range of political and social issues through their work, how they presented and represented women and womanhood, and how the organisation, formed and embedded in the Edwardian period, diversified during and after the First and Second World Wars.
Alison Brysk
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- September 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780199982660
- eISBN:
- 9780199362523
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199982660.003.0006
- Subject:
- Political Science, International Relations and Politics, Comparative Politics
The plot of a narrative claim for human rights is delivered by a political performance. This chapter explores performance genres of testimonial, political theatre, protest allegories, and parody. It ...
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The plot of a narrative claim for human rights is delivered by a political performance. This chapter explores performance genres of testimonial, political theatre, protest allegories, and parody. It profiles cases of the Vagina Monologues, India's Anna Hazare protest movement, political satire in Russia, and the Colbert Report.Less
The plot of a narrative claim for human rights is delivered by a political performance. This chapter explores performance genres of testimonial, political theatre, protest allegories, and parody. It profiles cases of the Vagina Monologues, India's Anna Hazare protest movement, political satire in Russia, and the Colbert Report.
Brett A. Houk and Ashley Booher
- Published in print:
- 2020
- Published Online:
- September 2020
- ISBN:
- 9780813066226
- eISBN:
- 9780813058375
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University Press of Florida
- DOI:
- 10.5744/florida/9780813066226.003.0008
- Subject:
- Archaeology, Archaeological Methodology and Techniques
Approaching monumentality and politics at an epicentral-scale, Houk and Ashley Booher use a site-planning approach in chapter 8 to argue that the Late Classic rulers of Chan Chich, Belize designed ...
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Approaching monumentality and politics at an epicentral-scale, Houk and Ashley Booher use a site-planning approach in chapter 8 to argue that the Late Classic rulers of Chan Chich, Belize designed major architectural components of the site to function as the theater for public spectacles and processions. The authors are able to demonstrate evidence for rituals’ having taken place along the two causeways and at their termini structures, as well as an apparent functional relationship between one causeway and an associated courtyard. Ritual, in this case, was actually the means to a political end. As Houk and Booher show, converting the monumental landscape of Chan Chich into a vast stage for public spectacle and ritual processions required considerable planning, labor, and resources. The Late Classic rulers at Chan Chich and other sites spent vast resources on the architecture of political theater as an exercise in community building and regional competition for labor, loyalty, and prestige.Less
Approaching monumentality and politics at an epicentral-scale, Houk and Ashley Booher use a site-planning approach in chapter 8 to argue that the Late Classic rulers of Chan Chich, Belize designed major architectural components of the site to function as the theater for public spectacles and processions. The authors are able to demonstrate evidence for rituals’ having taken place along the two causeways and at their termini structures, as well as an apparent functional relationship between one causeway and an associated courtyard. Ritual, in this case, was actually the means to a political end. As Houk and Booher show, converting the monumental landscape of Chan Chich into a vast stage for public spectacle and ritual processions required considerable planning, labor, and resources. The Late Classic rulers at Chan Chich and other sites spent vast resources on the architecture of political theater as an exercise in community building and regional competition for labor, loyalty, and prestige.
Alison Light
- Published in print:
- 2021
- Published Online:
- May 2022
- ISBN:
- 9781474481557
- eISBN:
- 9781399509534
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9781474481557.003.0006
- Subject:
- Literature, Criticism/Theory
A review essay discussing Churchill’s play in 1991 which represented the collapse of communism in Romania as in part a kind of de-repression, allowing wild forces to surface in society. Written as ...
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A review essay discussing Churchill’s play in 1991 which represented the collapse of communism in Romania as in part a kind of de-repression, allowing wild forces to surface in society. Written as political events evolved, the play tried to connect political turmoil with psychic tumult, the overthrow of repressive regimes as producing an inner world turned upside-down.
The essay asks whether we can hold on to political idealism in the contemporary world where individualism appears to have triumphed.Less
A review essay discussing Churchill’s play in 1991 which represented the collapse of communism in Romania as in part a kind of de-repression, allowing wild forces to surface in society. Written as political events evolved, the play tried to connect political turmoil with psychic tumult, the overthrow of repressive regimes as producing an inner world turned upside-down.
The essay asks whether we can hold on to political idealism in the contemporary world where individualism appears to have triumphed.
