This past week has been filled with reflection as I attempted to create a manifesto, a treatise on my understanding of art. Sounds easy, no? As I have been working on this assignment, I have recalled many moments from my life in the theatre, and one moment continually pops back into my consciousness. As I have been reading Shannon Jackson's Social Works: Performing Art, Supporting Publics this week, I came across this passage: "the child is riveting because of her potential to destroy the aesthetic frame; in her phenomenological presence and her social unpredictability, she is a walking threat to the divide between art and life" (241). Jackson's work attempts to expand the realm of theatre as she examines the impact and construction of performance studies and more experimental approaches. She provides many examples of the work she is impacted by, the work she values, however the passage above has wiped all those out of my head in favor of this one memory: I taught a Shakespeare camp in urban Kansas City for two summers in which the campers performed an abbreviated version of a show at the end of camp. The summer that we taught Othello, I had a camper named Tarran. Tarran was a scholarship camper, eight years old, and a poor reader, and yet he was there in my Shakespeare camp. With his wonderful energy and humor--he used to do "The Tarran" for us when we played Freeze Dance--Tarran tackled language far beyond his experience. Tarran played our Roderigo. Now, when his big death scene came, Tarran was to be stabbed, and then crumble to the ground. At the performance, on a professional stage, Tarran took his stabbing with conviction and proceeded to take an entire minute to die. His death was tragic. As he stumbled his way downstage, weaving through his bewildered and giggling cast mates, he found the stairs that lead to the audience, draping himself dramatically across them, he locked eyes on Iago, extended his pointed finger and proclaimed him an "inhuman dAWg!" and succumbed to his death. The audience roared with laughter and applause as Tarran picked his head up, shot the audience a smile and wave, then let his head fall back into death. None of it was planned, and it was wonderful. This moment refers to exactly what Jackson is intimating, and yet stands beyond Jackson's words as a beautiful example of why I love the theatre and what it means to me. The experience goes beyond theory.
This past week I was also lucky enough to watch Bill Irwin's Regard of Flight. In it Irwin fights against an immutable proscenium as he interacts with the reincarnations of the theatre. In case you've never experience this piece, here is a brief link. But these two experiences, born out of distinctly different levels of proficiency, speak to the same thought: that the theatre can be so much more than just a framed picture with warm bodies moving about within instead of cold pixels. What Tarran and Bill both achieved in these moments was beautifully pure interaction and play with the audience and for the audience. As Jackson tries to take us into what she believes the future of the theatre will look like, I see Tarran and his spontaneous, joyful, living moment. The theatre should be joyful, even when it makes you cry. The theatre should be spontaneous if for no other reason than because it can be. The theatre must live so that it will not die.
Jackson, Shannon. Social Works: Performing Art, Supporting Publics. New York: Routledge, 2011. Print.
Monday, April 9, 2012
Sunday, April 1, 2012
He Digged the Hole and the Whole Held Him
Of art, Plato once said, "the imitator is a long way off the truth, and can do all things because he lightly touches on a small part of them, and that part of an image" (316). He rails against the imitation of truth that occurs in art because "a man is not to be reverenced more than the truth" (313). Though many disagree with Plato's belief, his protege Aristotle for one, these types of comments and commentary persist even today. There is indeed a great debate amongst theoretical aestheticians as to the nature and purpose of art, and whether imitation serves as a part of art's function. Marxist theorists feel that art that is not designed to create revolution is frivolous and belonging to the out-of-touch Upper classes. Black aesthetics also utilize the purpose and functionality of art. But for all this, Plato fails to see the merit in utilizing imitation in art.
I've mentioned Alvin Ailey before and was lucky enough to watch his seminal work "Revelations" once more. The piece tells the story of the African-American's struggle from slavery to freedom through faith and determination. It was first produced in 1960 with a company and choreographer that did not experience slavery directly, however the political upheaval at the time represent for us the impact that slavery still had on them. I bring this up again in the contemplation of Rebecca Schneider's Performing Remains. In it, Schneider embarks upon an explanation of the vast political potential imitative art can have. By imitative, I mean thoughtful, purposeful and considered art; "Revelations" uses spiritual song to guide its story and thought. Schneider recounts many different uses of imitation such as Civil War reenactments and historical references in plays. Plato would sigh heartily at such manipulative reuse of factual truth in order to create art. But Schneider makes use of the reenactments she recounts. Indeed, she notes that "'Reenactment' is a term that has entered into increased circulation in late twentieth- and early twenty-first-century art, theatre, and performance circles. The practice of re-playing or re-doing a precedent event, artwork, or act has exploded in performance-based art [...]. In many ways, reenactment has become the popular and practice-based wing of what has been called the twentieth-century academic 'memory industry'" (2).
There is of course the old adage that those who do not learn history and doomed to repeat it. Schneider postulates an inversion of the saying, that who repeat history are doomed to learn from it. This is where I find my own 'in' to this work. I am young, most of my understanding of the world is through learned events and not lived ones. The theatre has always been a space for me to access the rest of the world--the whole of history, if you will. For me, when historical events are referenced, reenacted, reinterpreted, I am able to find the universality of humanity. Watching The Scottsboro Boys and then learning of the murder of Trayvon Martin, I can understand the extent of racism in this country and how it is still a cause we must fight to rectify. Watching a reinvisioning of a Shakespeare play like Hamlet applies those same themes and thoughts to a contemporary world, giving them weight and constancy. Listening to Trent Reznor's adaptation of "In the Hall of the Mountain King" shows me the possibility of the classics and how they can be opened up for new audiences and new meaning without damaging the integrity of the original. This is where Plato got caught. He believed that imitation and the arts compromised the integrity of the truth, that the truth is king and anything that clouds it is an abomination. But Plato never tapped into the potential of mimesis that Schneider has found, that Suzan-Lori Parks has found, that Alvin Ailey found.
I have always been drawn to the contemporary. Art, music, culture, I have always preferred the new and innovative over the dated and classic. And yet, without an established classic, there is no innovation. Perhaps I am a product of these times, as Schneider thinks this craze of reenactment is indicative of, however I believe that I am a more so a person who seeks desperately to understand myself. This understanding seems to be a mix of past and present, and the lens through which I look to the future from the past is the one that determines what path I shall follow. It is funny, I gravitate strongly towards theatre instead of film because I so very much thrive on the 'live-ness' of theatre, and yet, many of the experiences that have deeply impacted me are remnants of history. Do I enjoy the questioning of the placedness that Schneider finds key or do I simply like learning history in this manner? What is it that makes me a thespian and not an artist? Why do I want work--both my own and other's--to be presented in the moment and in the living space? Is it the hole or the whole that I seek? Do I want to be totally immersed in an event or do I want that event to weave its way through my life intricately and delicately?
Plato. The Republic. Ed. G. R. F. Ferrari. Trans. Tom Griffith. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2000.
Schneider, Rebecca. Performing Remains: Art and War in Times of Theatrical Reenactment. New York: Routledge, 2011.
I've mentioned Alvin Ailey before and was lucky enough to watch his seminal work "Revelations" once more. The piece tells the story of the African-American's struggle from slavery to freedom through faith and determination. It was first produced in 1960 with a company and choreographer that did not experience slavery directly, however the political upheaval at the time represent for us the impact that slavery still had on them. I bring this up again in the contemplation of Rebecca Schneider's Performing Remains. In it, Schneider embarks upon an explanation of the vast political potential imitative art can have. By imitative, I mean thoughtful, purposeful and considered art; "Revelations" uses spiritual song to guide its story and thought. Schneider recounts many different uses of imitation such as Civil War reenactments and historical references in plays. Plato would sigh heartily at such manipulative reuse of factual truth in order to create art. But Schneider makes use of the reenactments she recounts. Indeed, she notes that "'Reenactment' is a term that has entered into increased circulation in late twentieth- and early twenty-first-century art, theatre, and performance circles. The practice of re-playing or re-doing a precedent event, artwork, or act has exploded in performance-based art [...]. In many ways, reenactment has become the popular and practice-based wing of what has been called the twentieth-century academic 'memory industry'" (2).
There is of course the old adage that those who do not learn history and doomed to repeat it. Schneider postulates an inversion of the saying, that who repeat history are doomed to learn from it. This is where I find my own 'in' to this work. I am young, most of my understanding of the world is through learned events and not lived ones. The theatre has always been a space for me to access the rest of the world--the whole of history, if you will. For me, when historical events are referenced, reenacted, reinterpreted, I am able to find the universality of humanity. Watching The Scottsboro Boys and then learning of the murder of Trayvon Martin, I can understand the extent of racism in this country and how it is still a cause we must fight to rectify. Watching a reinvisioning of a Shakespeare play like Hamlet applies those same themes and thoughts to a contemporary world, giving them weight and constancy. Listening to Trent Reznor's adaptation of "In the Hall of the Mountain King" shows me the possibility of the classics and how they can be opened up for new audiences and new meaning without damaging the integrity of the original. This is where Plato got caught. He believed that imitation and the arts compromised the integrity of the truth, that the truth is king and anything that clouds it is an abomination. But Plato never tapped into the potential of mimesis that Schneider has found, that Suzan-Lori Parks has found, that Alvin Ailey found.
I have always been drawn to the contemporary. Art, music, culture, I have always preferred the new and innovative over the dated and classic. And yet, without an established classic, there is no innovation. Perhaps I am a product of these times, as Schneider thinks this craze of reenactment is indicative of, however I believe that I am a more so a person who seeks desperately to understand myself. This understanding seems to be a mix of past and present, and the lens through which I look to the future from the past is the one that determines what path I shall follow. It is funny, I gravitate strongly towards theatre instead of film because I so very much thrive on the 'live-ness' of theatre, and yet, many of the experiences that have deeply impacted me are remnants of history. Do I enjoy the questioning of the placedness that Schneider finds key or do I simply like learning history in this manner? What is it that makes me a thespian and not an artist? Why do I want work--both my own and other's--to be presented in the moment and in the living space? Is it the hole or the whole that I seek? Do I want to be totally immersed in an event or do I want that event to weave its way through my life intricately and delicately?
Plato. The Republic. Ed. G. R. F. Ferrari. Trans. Tom Griffith. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2000.
Schneider, Rebecca. Performing Remains: Art and War in Times of Theatrical Reenactment. New York: Routledge, 2011.
Monday, March 26, 2012
What Can I Say?
I grew up in an affluent, very white suburb in Kansas. My experience with the black body could be condensed down to this:
I'd like to think that we were a bit more soulful in our day, but those are the same robes, the same shells and the same 120 white kids conducted by a white guy singing a song written for a very different choir.
I'd had history and read To Kill A Mockingbird, but I still didn't really get it. Then I moved to Boston and my understanding broadened. I met Robbie McCauley and worked on a production of Lady Day at Emerson's Bar and Grill.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h4ZyuULy9zs
I learned about the Scottsboro Boys and I started to understand just what has been done to these people.
Now I know my understanding can only go so far, that I will always be distanced from this place of identity, and yet I can still be a voice, still use my voice to stop the continuing racism that occurs in this country.
Embodying Black Experience is yet another source of my understanding and education. The types of objectification and it's acceptance by the subject are not new to me, I have enough feminist history to recognize subjugation when I read about it. And yet, this experience took me away from Kimberle Crenshaw and into the corner of bell hooks. I cannot claim that, as a white woman, my oppression just as corrosive as that of Saartjie Baartman, or Sally, Robbie's grandmother. Or even Joe Louis.
I can be an ally and an advocate. I can be hurt when I hear of Trayvon Martin and wear a hoodie in solidarity with the cause. But can I really be part of it? I'm still not sure. We learn about things and think we understand and debate about who is allowed to become an authority about what. But deep down, I feel I have no right to insert myself into race theory or nonwhite culture, just as it infuriates me that only men deciding my reproductive rights.
I can empathize but I cannot sympathize, and so at times I just don't know what to say. So I'll let someone else say it for me:
"Let America Be America Again" Langston Hughes
Let America be America again.
Let it be the dream it used to be.
Let it be the pioneer on the plain
Seeking a home where he himself is free.
(America never was America to me.)
Let America be the dream the dreamers dreamed--
Let it be that great strong land of love
Where never kings connive nor tyrants scheme
That any man be crushed by one above.
(It never was America to me.)
O, let my land be a land where Liberty
Is crowned with no false patriotic wreath,
But opportunity is real, and life is free,
Equality is in the air we breathe.
(There's never been equality for me,
Nor freedom in this "homeland of the free.")
Say, who are you that mumbles in the dark?
And who are you that draws your veil across the stars?
I am the poor white, fooled and pushed apart,
I am the Negro bearing slavery's scars.
I am the red man driven from the land,
I am the immigrant clutching the hope I seek--
And finding only the same old stupid plan
Of dog eat dog, of mighty crush the weak.
I am the young man, full of strength and hope,
Tangled in that ancient endless chain
Of profit, power, gain, of grab the land!
Of grab the gold! Of grab the ways of satisfying need!
Of work the men! Of take the pay!
Of owning everything for one's own greed!
I am the farmer, bondsman to the soil.
I am the worker sold to the machine.
I am the Negro, servant to you all.
I am the people, humble, hungry, mean--
Hungry yet today despite the dream.
Beaten yet today--O, Pioneers!
I am the man who never got ahead,
The poorest worker bartered through the years.
Yet I'm the one who dreamt our basic dream
In the Old World while still a serf of kings,
Who dreamt a dream so strong, so brave, so true,
That even yet its mighty daring sings
In every brick and stone, in every furrow turned
That's made America the land it has become.
O, I'm the man who sailed those early seas
In search of what I meant to be my home--
For I'm the one who left dark Ireland's shore,
And Poland's plain, and England's grassy lea,
And torn from Black Africa's strand I came
To build a "homeland of the free."
The free?
Who said the free? Not me?
Surely not me? The millions on relief today?
The millions shot down when we strike?
The millions who have nothing for our pay?
For all the dreams we've dreamed
And all the songs we've sung
And all the hopes we've held
And all the flags we've hung,
The millions who have nothing for our pay--
Except the dream that's almost dead today.
O, let America be America again--
The land that never has been yet--
And yet must be--the land where every man is free.
The land that's mine--the poor man's, Indian's, Negro's, ME--
Who made America,
Whose sweat and blood, whose faith and pain,
Whose hand at the foundry, whose plow in the rain,
Must bring back our mighty dream again.
Sure, call me any ugly name you choose--
The steel of freedom does not stain.
From those who live like leeches on the people's lives,
We must take back our land again,
America!
O, yes,
I say it plain,
America never was America to me,
And yet I swear this oath--
America will be!
Out of the rack and ruin of our gangster death,
The rape and rot of graft, and stealth, and lies,
We, the people, must redeem
The land, the mines, the plants, the rivers.
The mountains and the endless plain--
All, all the stretch of these great green states--
And make America again!
I'd like to think that we were a bit more soulful in our day, but those are the same robes, the same shells and the same 120 white kids conducted by a white guy singing a song written for a very different choir.
I'd had history and read To Kill A Mockingbird, but I still didn't really get it. Then I moved to Boston and my understanding broadened. I met Robbie McCauley and worked on a production of Lady Day at Emerson's Bar and Grill.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h4ZyuULy9zs
I learned about the Scottsboro Boys and I started to understand just what has been done to these people.
Now I know my understanding can only go so far, that I will always be distanced from this place of identity, and yet I can still be a voice, still use my voice to stop the continuing racism that occurs in this country.
Embodying Black Experience is yet another source of my understanding and education. The types of objectification and it's acceptance by the subject are not new to me, I have enough feminist history to recognize subjugation when I read about it. And yet, this experience took me away from Kimberle Crenshaw and into the corner of bell hooks. I cannot claim that, as a white woman, my oppression just as corrosive as that of Saartjie Baartman, or Sally, Robbie's grandmother. Or even Joe Louis.
I can be an ally and an advocate. I can be hurt when I hear of Trayvon Martin and wear a hoodie in solidarity with the cause. But can I really be part of it? I'm still not sure. We learn about things and think we understand and debate about who is allowed to become an authority about what. But deep down, I feel I have no right to insert myself into race theory or nonwhite culture, just as it infuriates me that only men deciding my reproductive rights.
I can empathize but I cannot sympathize, and so at times I just don't know what to say. So I'll let someone else say it for me:
"Let America Be America Again" Langston Hughes
Let America be America again.
Let it be the dream it used to be.
Let it be the pioneer on the plain
Seeking a home where he himself is free.
(America never was America to me.)
Let America be the dream the dreamers dreamed--
Let it be that great strong land of love
Where never kings connive nor tyrants scheme
That any man be crushed by one above.
(It never was America to me.)
O, let my land be a land where Liberty
Is crowned with no false patriotic wreath,
But opportunity is real, and life is free,
Equality is in the air we breathe.
(There's never been equality for me,
Nor freedom in this "homeland of the free.")
Say, who are you that mumbles in the dark?
And who are you that draws your veil across the stars?
I am the poor white, fooled and pushed apart,
I am the Negro bearing slavery's scars.
I am the red man driven from the land,
I am the immigrant clutching the hope I seek--
And finding only the same old stupid plan
Of dog eat dog, of mighty crush the weak.
I am the young man, full of strength and hope,
Tangled in that ancient endless chain
Of profit, power, gain, of grab the land!
Of grab the gold! Of grab the ways of satisfying need!
Of work the men! Of take the pay!
Of owning everything for one's own greed!
I am the farmer, bondsman to the soil.
I am the worker sold to the machine.
I am the Negro, servant to you all.
I am the people, humble, hungry, mean--
Hungry yet today despite the dream.
Beaten yet today--O, Pioneers!
I am the man who never got ahead,
The poorest worker bartered through the years.
Yet I'm the one who dreamt our basic dream
In the Old World while still a serf of kings,
Who dreamt a dream so strong, so brave, so true,
That even yet its mighty daring sings
In every brick and stone, in every furrow turned
That's made America the land it has become.
O, I'm the man who sailed those early seas
In search of what I meant to be my home--
For I'm the one who left dark Ireland's shore,
And Poland's plain, and England's grassy lea,
And torn from Black Africa's strand I came
To build a "homeland of the free."
The free?
Who said the free? Not me?
Surely not me? The millions on relief today?
The millions shot down when we strike?
The millions who have nothing for our pay?
For all the dreams we've dreamed
And all the songs we've sung
And all the hopes we've held
And all the flags we've hung,
The millions who have nothing for our pay--
Except the dream that's almost dead today.
O, let America be America again--
The land that never has been yet--
And yet must be--the land where every man is free.
The land that's mine--the poor man's, Indian's, Negro's, ME--
Who made America,
Whose sweat and blood, whose faith and pain,
Whose hand at the foundry, whose plow in the rain,
Must bring back our mighty dream again.
Sure, call me any ugly name you choose--
The steel of freedom does not stain.
From those who live like leeches on the people's lives,
We must take back our land again,
America!
O, yes,
I say it plain,
America never was America to me,
And yet I swear this oath--
America will be!
Out of the rack and ruin of our gangster death,
The rape and rot of graft, and stealth, and lies,
We, the people, must redeem
The land, the mines, the plants, the rivers.
The mountains and the endless plain--
All, all the stretch of these great green states--
And make America again!
Monday, March 19, 2012
Dance Dance Revolution
I should have been a dancer.
I didn't have
the discipline to keep up my ballet as a child and now I don't have the
body, but I really should have been a dancer. There's just something
incomparable about the experience of watching and, better yet, doing
dance. This semester has provided many opportunities to remind me of
how much I love dance and need to dance. Either from listing the most
influential performances I've seen (yup, mostly all dance) or
experiencing Fela!, an Afro-beat memorial to the great Fela Kuti. Nadine George-Graves' Urban Bush Women
reminds me once again how important I find dance. George-Graves
describes the process choreographer Jawole Willa Jo Zollar undergoes
through to work out a dance, how she lets the mood, the spirit of the
music overtake her and direct her. She makes mistakes, edits herself,
but really she is working out an impulse, channeling something greater
than herself, a story. Immediately, this passage reminds me of a group I
was lucky enough to be involved with called InterPlay. This
California-based method seeks to unlock the wisdom of the body by
utilizing "forms" of movement, story, silence, song, ease and
amusement. It
is an experiment in movement-based play that frees you from seriousness
so that you can be more in tune with your body and experience the world
from a freer place. It seeks to reconnect the mind, body, heart and
spirit in a world that has become too fragmented and regimented. Apart
from my own selfish pleasure in this experience, I have continually used
exercises from my time there in classrooms, helping to reconnect
students with themselves. For this reason, the passage, "Spirituality means different things to different people, and
in many respects it defies definition, which is, of course, part of its
power. Too, spirituality has long
been considered a path to healing and liberation" (138) resonated with
me and my relationship to dance and movement in general. To me, dance
is a spiritual experience. InterPlay taps into that connection for me.
The passage also brings to mind one of my most moving experiences as an
audience to a piece of dance: Alvin Ailey's Revelations. I included a
link to a YouTube clip of the piece in case you don't have any
experience with it. The work sets dance to traditional spirituals and
gospel songs, and experiences the songs on stage in a way I have never
connected with music. The joy, thought and essence incorporated into
the work took me to a place that I have not experienced on my own, it
brought me into Alvin's world. In this way, George-Graves' book
attempts to take the reader into the world of Zollar and to experience
it through her relationship with dance. The chapter The Body: Divided
and Conquered examines how Zollar addresses stereotypes and assumptions
of the body by focusing on that part and dancing with it. What I will take from this reading and all these experiences is that dance has such a powerful ability to impact its participants, those who engage with and those who observe dance. This reading also reminds me of the power that dance has in narrative. It has lit a flame in me to incorporate dance into the theatre I create and to work dance more into the classes that I teach. Just as we learn with multiple intelligences, why can't we art with multiple mediums?
Monday, March 5, 2012
Revised Directions
I'm taking a bit of a a break from my normal call and response from academic texts to discuss an article handed to me by my professor instead. The article is D. Soyini Madison's "Performing Theory/ Embodied Writing" from Text and Performance Quarterly (April 1999) if anybody wants to find it. In it, Madison writes about the interrelation of theory and performance, how theory enhances performance when the performer knows where theories begin. She describes her "performance romanticism" and calls herself a "performance essentialist." Though it has been a while since I have formally performed--almost a year that seem a lifetime ago-- it occurs to me that I never really stopped. In the aforementioned instance, I was Marie, the maid to a murderous and sadistic professor a la Ionesco, but now, I am Ph.D. student. It is a new role and one that I am navigating roughly, though somehow managing a decently straight line. Madison warns of those who claim performance is everyday life, but for this role, this instance, I am going to assert this fallacy. I am not being me, but 'student me'. It takes a while to remember that these two are different. At this point, I am a professional student and necessarily very good at it, I really don't feel that anyone who is not good at school could survive this long in it, it's just too hard. But my student self has taken over a bit. Granted, most of my time is devoted to school work and student obligations, but am I missing the forest of personhood for the trees of studentdom? That is a very prosaic statement that I'm not sure if I like, however I'll continue. This post is really coming out of a stress-induced, sleep-deprived, poorly timed event that happened last week. I was crying in front of my peers for the first time and, upon trying to put into words why it was I was crying, I could only respond "I don't need this right now." But the event to which I was responding was par for the course in student me's life. It was the real me, the non-performance me, that stood up and took over. I had to stop performing because I just couldn't keep up the act anymore. It's distressing and unsettling for anyone who isn't expecting it, but perhaps even more so for a person who is so keenly aware of performance but fails to recognize their own.
My point is this: who has the responsibility to control performance? As a director, I feel unsettled when someone is not in control of the general shape of a performance. As a person, I am unsettled when I realize that not even I am in control of my own performance. First of all, should there be a person/being/entity in charge of performance? I am inclined to think that at least society should. We have so many regulations in place to protect us from the evils of Freud's Id, those crazed barbarians who drink and smoke and rob and pillage and plunder. Human consensus tells us that these people are wrong, that they are out of control, that they are not performing 'human' correctly, and so we remove them from the playing field. But I have spent this entire semester reading that social codes are not correct and should be amended if not annihilated. So what then? Madison suggests theory. "Theory comes from everywhere and you decide go back...to recognize again and more" (110). Judith Butler also alludes to this idea of theory as a guide post. We cannot rely on social norms, for they are merely stylized repetitions turned into fact. But if we examine where the behaviors started, we can recall the impulse and the belief in them that started the behavior to begin with. I remember being in the 7th grade, the first year we were allowed to write in print again, and disliking how I made my 'a's--just an 'o' with a tail really. I felt they were pedantic and beneath the dignity to which I held myself. So I decided to change them to the more formal 'a's that are conveniently represented in this font. I truly believed that my teachers would think I was more sophisticated if I made this change. It took a while, but eventually I made it a habit and still make them in this manner. As I write this I recall a moment in the second grade when I decided to revert to my legal name Julia instead of the nickname Julie as it represented the maturity I felt I had at the ripe age of eight and also my conversion of traditional '7's to ones with horizontal marks through them, again for the same reason. These are all instances of performance, where I am willingly modifying my behavior in the hope of altering my perception, but they are all rooted in the belief that these adjustments would be successful. There is a very fine difference there, but it is one I think Madison would recognize. These instances of performed theory, albeit my own sophomoric theory, are rooted in moments of recognition, that I was first inadequate in my current state, and that there was a change I could implement to correct my inadequacy.
I believe I had yet another one of those moments last week, crying in my office. There is something wrong either in my performance of a Ph.D. student because I am not operating either successfully--thus not needing to cry--or in my performance of a person--thus not noticing that the Ph.D. performance had run amok with myself. I need to reexamine. I need to determine if an adjustment should be made and how it should be implemented. But most helpfully, I need to go back to my theory to look for guidance and wisdom.
My point is this: who has the responsibility to control performance? As a director, I feel unsettled when someone is not in control of the general shape of a performance. As a person, I am unsettled when I realize that not even I am in control of my own performance. First of all, should there be a person/being/entity in charge of performance? I am inclined to think that at least society should. We have so many regulations in place to protect us from the evils of Freud's Id, those crazed barbarians who drink and smoke and rob and pillage and plunder. Human consensus tells us that these people are wrong, that they are out of control, that they are not performing 'human' correctly, and so we remove them from the playing field. But I have spent this entire semester reading that social codes are not correct and should be amended if not annihilated. So what then? Madison suggests theory. "Theory comes from everywhere and you decide go back...to recognize again and more" (110). Judith Butler also alludes to this idea of theory as a guide post. We cannot rely on social norms, for they are merely stylized repetitions turned into fact. But if we examine where the behaviors started, we can recall the impulse and the belief in them that started the behavior to begin with. I remember being in the 7th grade, the first year we were allowed to write in print again, and disliking how I made my 'a's--just an 'o' with a tail really. I felt they were pedantic and beneath the dignity to which I held myself. So I decided to change them to the more formal 'a's that are conveniently represented in this font. I truly believed that my teachers would think I was more sophisticated if I made this change. It took a while, but eventually I made it a habit and still make them in this manner. As I write this I recall a moment in the second grade when I decided to revert to my legal name Julia instead of the nickname Julie as it represented the maturity I felt I had at the ripe age of eight and also my conversion of traditional '7's to ones with horizontal marks through them, again for the same reason. These are all instances of performance, where I am willingly modifying my behavior in the hope of altering my perception, but they are all rooted in the belief that these adjustments would be successful. There is a very fine difference there, but it is one I think Madison would recognize. These instances of performed theory, albeit my own sophomoric theory, are rooted in moments of recognition, that I was first inadequate in my current state, and that there was a change I could implement to correct my inadequacy.
I believe I had yet another one of those moments last week, crying in my office. There is something wrong either in my performance of a Ph.D. student because I am not operating either successfully--thus not needing to cry--or in my performance of a person--thus not noticing that the Ph.D. performance had run amok with myself. I need to reexamine. I need to determine if an adjustment should be made and how it should be implemented. But most helpfully, I need to go back to my theory to look for guidance and wisdom.
Monday, February 27, 2012
Much Ado about Everything
Reading this week about the history of Asian American theatre in the wonderful book by Esther Kim Lee, I've started to wonder about the impetus behind "color-blind" casting and it has presented itself in educational theatre. Now I have witnessed and been a part of many instances of this type of casting. Some were natural, some poignant and some were completely nonsensical. Lee's book, which starts with an examination of the racism and stereotyping of Asians in the majority of 20th century American drama, examine the reinforcement of such beliefs about Asians and how they impacted the presence of Asian representation. Here I remember a much beloved version on Cole Porter's Anything Goes, done by my high school, and the two Chinese converts who wore conical hats and ran an illegal gambling ring on the lower levels of the ship. They were played by two white students who donned exaggerated eye liner and kept their hands firmly pressed together when not rolling dice. No changes to the lines were made in this production to account for the fact that the actors were not Asian, their costumes presented the stereotype in a way that allowed the Audience of Kansans to understand and accept the discrepancy. The next year, my high school put on Once of this Island, a tale of the Caribbean, in which only four of the 120 cast members we're black. The line referring to the "black peasant girls from the village beyond" was changed to "young peasant girls" and the line "a beautiful child the pale color of coffee mixed with cream" was adjusted too: "the color of peaches mixed with cream". I wonder know why the same school and audience could accept painfully stereotypical assumptions of Asians in one show and then require ridiculous adjustments for Caribbean characters. It seems that Lee would sadly frown and nod at this anecdote.
A more successful use of colorblind casting, and indeed more true to the intent of the term, would be I the revival of You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown in which the beloved Peanuts characters were cast regardless of race. Lucy was played by a white actress and her younger brother, Linus, was played by an Asian actor. Lucy's love interest, Schroeder, drawn as a blonde was played by a black man. The actors appeared in the expected costumes from the comic strip and casting became a non-issue.
What is it about a show's casting that makes one offensive and another respectful, or at the least, inclusive? How do we address race in contemporary theatre? Do we bow to societal conventions because theatre is "an illusion of reality" (24), as Lee refers to it, that we must consistently reference in order to be deemed realistic? Or is there something mmore sinister at work, an unconscious refusal to accept progressive views of humanity on stage? There is not clear cut answer, of course, but I have often sat in a casting session perplexed. Does changing the race of a character change the meaning of the show? I have heard many directors make this argument, that including non-white actors into a cast, the play invariably becomes about race. Many directors comfort themselves with this notion of choosing to exclude races so as not to make a play about race. And yet, about the Shakespeare Theatre's 1997 "photo-negative" production of Othello it was stated that "in the race reversing, the company seeks to shatter stereotypes and remind playgoers of the endlessly adaptive nature of Shakespeare's exploration of otherness" (Marks). Why cannot all plays remind playgoers of the versatility of the stage?
Accounts of the many exclusions and inequalities of the theatre like Lee's sadden and embolden me to make a change within my own aesthetic. The theatre has always been, to me, an inclusive place where people are judged by their contributions, not their appearance. Books like Lee's inspire me to continue working toward a theatre at does not view race is such stereotypical terms, a theatre that can be used as a platform to set an example and present the issues still present in society.
Lee, Esther Kim. A History of Asian American Theatre. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006. Print.
Marks, Peter. "The Green-Eyed Monster Fells Men of Every Color." New York Times 21 November 1997. Online.
A more successful use of colorblind casting, and indeed more true to the intent of the term, would be I the revival of You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown in which the beloved Peanuts characters were cast regardless of race. Lucy was played by a white actress and her younger brother, Linus, was played by an Asian actor. Lucy's love interest, Schroeder, drawn as a blonde was played by a black man. The actors appeared in the expected costumes from the comic strip and casting became a non-issue.
What is it about a show's casting that makes one offensive and another respectful, or at the least, inclusive? How do we address race in contemporary theatre? Do we bow to societal conventions because theatre is "an illusion of reality" (24), as Lee refers to it, that we must consistently reference in order to be deemed realistic? Or is there something mmore sinister at work, an unconscious refusal to accept progressive views of humanity on stage? There is not clear cut answer, of course, but I have often sat in a casting session perplexed. Does changing the race of a character change the meaning of the show? I have heard many directors make this argument, that including non-white actors into a cast, the play invariably becomes about race. Many directors comfort themselves with this notion of choosing to exclude races so as not to make a play about race. And yet, about the Shakespeare Theatre's 1997 "photo-negative" production of Othello it was stated that "in the race reversing, the company seeks to shatter stereotypes and remind playgoers of the endlessly adaptive nature of Shakespeare's exploration of otherness" (Marks). Why cannot all plays remind playgoers of the versatility of the stage?
Accounts of the many exclusions and inequalities of the theatre like Lee's sadden and embolden me to make a change within my own aesthetic. The theatre has always been, to me, an inclusive place where people are judged by their contributions, not their appearance. Books like Lee's inspire me to continue working toward a theatre at does not view race is such stereotypical terms, a theatre that can be used as a platform to set an example and present the issues still present in society.
Lee, Esther Kim. A History of Asian American Theatre. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006. Print.
Marks, Peter. "The Green-Eyed Monster Fells Men of Every Color." New York Times 21 November 1997. Online.
Monday, February 20, 2012
Stop, Look, and Listen
Today, I've been reading about performance studies, and, for probably the first time, have started not understand what that term means. Diana Taylor says, "performance explores the use and significance of gesture, movement, and body language to make sense of the world" (77). She also says, "performance is not just a doing, a form of carrying through" (77), it is so much more than the preconceived presentation of script and movement. Performance is deeply psychological. When we edit our thoughts to be polite, persuasive or inoffensive, we perform a version of ourselves. This act of being is performance, and therefore those who study behavior are a part of the umbrella that is 'Performance Studies'.
What this leads me to wonder is, what are we performing that we do not mean to present? Taylor mentions that the Natural History Museum presents marginalized cultures as exhibits. What message is this performing? That these cultures are overlooked and must be foregrounded to gain attention? Or that these cultures are so removed from the normative experience that we can safely observe and judge them, that they are just as animalistic as the stuffed lion that shares the diorama? These cannot be consciously selected subjects of performance, but they are performative. How can we control thee subjects we present when, to quote a colleague, "our very atoms at work are performance"?
For me, we must be aware. In a way, I feel that Diana Taylor would agree with me, we must be as conscious as possible of what we present to the world. The content with which we perform our lives. Some gain this through education, some through consideration, others observation. As a group of actors would never present a performance without a rehearsal, without a conscious attempt at interpreting a text and crafting a message, so to should humans never present a performance without at least contemplating the finial product. We all experience moments when we fly off the handle, when we speak without thinking. But if we weight our own thoughts routinely, we are less likely to perform something that differs from how we would choose to perform if we had time to consider. This probably makes more sense in my head than on blog, however, if we practice what we preach, if we practice what we perform, then perhaps we can become the thing we are only attempting to be. If we wonder what it is we are performing, doesn't Socrates allow that we will improve our message?
Saturday, February 11, 2012
When did Sesame Street stop teaching us?
I've been reading National Abjection: The Asian American Body Onstage by Karen Shimakawa this week. In it, she discusses the role of Asian Americans in drama and how they are represented as either intractable foreigners or noble converts to the American way. Her point being that Asians were not allowed to have their own culture and to have that culture be valuable. Either they maintained their cultural roots and were perpetual outsiders or they gave up their own traditions in favor of assimilation. The implications her arguments make are that white Americans cannot suffer independence of being. Now, I can argue against her claims all I want, but her proof is there in the examples she provides of theatrical performances where this type of stereotyping is painfully prevalent. What's worse is that this type of abjection is not reserved solely for Asian Americans. It is everywhere. Latino, African, Caribbean, Middle Eastern. What happened to "give me your tired, poor and huddled masses"? When did American's become such terrible people?
I can't help but think back to Sesame Street. Those monsters were some of my best friends. They taught me to count, spell, write and to be a kind person. To include others and share my toys. To listen to my parents and teachers. I can still spell and count. I know the colors and that C is for cookie. I even still listen to my parents. So why did I (the universal I) stop being inclusive? At what point between stopping watching Sesame Street did we unlearn that lesson? Did we really unlearn it? If that's the case, then human nature is exclusionary and tribal. Or did someone teach it to us? In that case, why didn't some other adult stand up and protest that lesson plan?
These questions concern me. It seems that I am part of a society that is oppressive, hateful and ignorant. These are some of the things that I cannot stand in others, and yet I must now accept it in myself because I choose to remain part of this society? I have always been plagued with this concern over being helpless, incapable of action and ultimately ineffectual. I can dedicate my life to righting the wrongs that Shimakawa addresses, but what good will it do in the grand scheme of things? Probably nothing. It's quite a disheartening prospect, being ineffective.
I can't help but think back to Sesame Street. Those monsters were some of my best friends. They taught me to count, spell, write and to be a kind person. To include others and share my toys. To listen to my parents and teachers. I can still spell and count. I know the colors and that C is for cookie. I even still listen to my parents. So why did I (the universal I) stop being inclusive? At what point between stopping watching Sesame Street did we unlearn that lesson? Did we really unlearn it? If that's the case, then human nature is exclusionary and tribal. Or did someone teach it to us? In that case, why didn't some other adult stand up and protest that lesson plan?
These questions concern me. It seems that I am part of a society that is oppressive, hateful and ignorant. These are some of the things that I cannot stand in others, and yet I must now accept it in myself because I choose to remain part of this society? I have always been plagued with this concern over being helpless, incapable of action and ultimately ineffectual. I can dedicate my life to righting the wrongs that Shimakawa addresses, but what good will it do in the grand scheme of things? Probably nothing. It's quite a disheartening prospect, being ineffective.
Monday, February 6, 2012
The Sameness of Difference
"Performances tend to reveal, whether the performers intend to or not, the intricately processual nature of relationships of difference...Performances provide the ways and means whereby a 'Free-born people' can be formed. "(Roach 76).
Joseph Roach wrote, in Cities of the Dead, about the evolution of cultural performativity through the examination of the Mardi Gras tradition in New Orleans. Roach makes the point that culture finds ways of presenting itself, even when oppressed or in a minority. People will find a way to maintain their heritage. I cannot speak to this directly, as I am in a dominant society with very few traditions. With no personal religious or hereditary cultural traditions in my life, I find it hard to connect with what Roach discusses. The melting-pot of America has always seemed, to me at least, to be a wasteland of half-remembered scraps of culture. I have always been jealous of my friends of varying colors who had traditions that were upheld by their families and had been so for generations. My traditions were formed when my parents married. Part of this cause is the very issue of the melting-pot. I had a very angry and slightly drunken verbal argument with an Irishman in a pub in Cork City, Ireland about American tourists' insistence on claiming Irish nationality. I tried to explain to him that Americans don't tend to have a heritage past a few generations so many claim their ancestry to connect with that greater sense of culture. He, of course, was terribly offended. I was shocked at his insensitivity. Obviously, being Irish is cool. Why would you deny someone a tiny part of that? Especially when being American only takes us back so far, whereas being Irish can take you back to before the expansion of the Roman Empire. I am also reminded of a conversation I had with a friend on a train in Boston about the meaning of 'queer' as it applied to the term 'LGBTQ'. As a heterosexual woman, sympathetic and also drawn to the gay aesthetic, I considered myself 'queer' and therefore a part of the term. She, a recently uncloseted lesbian, was greatly offended at my attempt to align myself with her new culture. I wasn't a part of it and could never understand it because I was on the outside. In retrospect, I see myself once more craving a greater, more discernible, culture than the one my WASPy upbringing provided. I question what Roach would say to my case, as I feel I have no culture to speak of that resonates outside of my own life, and yet I have created cultural connections for myself. Are these my Irish tribal influences grasping for a new tribe to call my own as Roach might suggest, or am I suffering from an existential crisis because of my lack of culture? Is this just a #firstworldproblem because I'm excited to wear a Sari at my friend's wedding and jealous that I don't get a four-day celebration too? Does participating in culture make you a part of the culture, or do you need an I.D. badge and a password to truly belong?
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)