CFP - Performing Ecologies

Alex Wilson Announcement
Location
New Zealand
Subject Fields
Cultural History / Studies, Humanities, Political History / Studies, Social Sciences, Theatre & Performance History / Studies

Call for Papers:

Performing Ecologies

An interdisciplinary conference hosted by

The Performance of the Real Research Theme

The University of Otago, Ōtepoti/Dunedin, New Zealand

21 – 23 November 2018

 

Keynote presenters:

Emeritus Professor Baz Kershaw* (School of Theatre & Performance Studies and Cultural & Media Policy Studies, University of Warwick, United Kingdom)

Louise Potiki-Bryant* (Ngāi Tahu Choreographer - Dancer - Video Artist)

 

The current “ecological crisis” has become a major contention, forming a variety of compelling performances which mediate and serve a complex nexus of political, ethical and social agendas. Indeed, many writers on ecology are increasingly arguing that we have to face the fact that the world is, so to speak, “in the shit”, and that, somehow, we have to learn to live with/in it. Besides attracting considerable media attention, there are questions raised around how performance – in a broad sense –might contribute to the discussion and work towards a more promising ecological future. By drawing together scholars and creative practitioners from a variety of fields to focus on the subject of ‘performing ecologies’, this interdisciplinary conference thus aims to provoke consideration of the role that performance and creative practice can and does play in our ‘learning to live with/in’ this “ecological crisis”.

We invite interdisciplinary and discipline –specific responses to any of the following provocations:

  • Ecocritical research of and through performance
  • Media framings and performances of ecology, the “ecological crisis” and climate change (post-truth)
  • The performance of “nature” and particular environments
  • Ecomimesis (Timothy Morton, 2007)
  • The efficacy of performing ecologies; what performance might ‘do’
  • The use of the environment in performance – such as site-specific theatre
  • Dark ecology
  • Performances of apocalypse / dystopic future
  • Affective ecologies
  • ‘Morality’ performances and mediations
  • The performance of environmental activism/ protest
  • Performances of ecology in/for tourism
  • Ecologies in indigenous paradigms
  • Performances of the Anthropocene
  • The performance of posthumanism and the environment

We welcome abstracts for papers, performances, panels or other presentation formats, such as installations. Please submit a 250-300-word abstract of your presentation and a 150-word biography for each presenter by August 3, 2018. Please send us your abstract as a Word document, and use your surname as the document title. Please clearly indicate the title of your presentation, as well as your full name (first name, surname) and institutional affiliation (if relevant). Please send your abstracts or any enquiries to the Theme administrator, Alex, at performance.real@otago.ac.nz.

There are a limited number of travel bursaries available for postgrad students. Please contact the theme administrator for details.

 

The Performance of the Real is a University of Otago funded interdisciplinary Research Theme. The project is to investigate what it is about representations and performances of the real that make them particularly compelling and pervasive in our current age. At its core is the study of how performance/performativity, in its many cultural, aesthetic, political and social forms and discourses, represents, critiques, stages, and constructs/reconstructs the real, as well as the ethical, social and form-related issues involved in such acts.

 

Website: http://www.otago.ac.nz/performance-of-the-real

 

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*Louise Potiki-Bryant is a Ngāi Tahu choreographer, dancer, and video artist. With her artistic practice Louise aims to honour her whakapapa (genealogy), and relationship to the whenua (land). Louise is a founding member and choreographer of Atamira. She has also choreographed for companies such as Black Grace Dance Company, The New Zealand Dance Company and Ōrotokare, Art, Story, Motion.

 

*Emeritus Professor Baz Kershaw is at the School of Theatre & Performance Studies and Cultural & Media Policy Studies, University of Warwick, United Kingdom, and is author of Theatre Ecology (2007). Baz has directed PARIP (2000-06) investigating performance as research. His projects in experimental/community/radical theatre include shows at London’s Drury Lane Arts Lab, with Welfare State International, and since 2000 several eco-specific events in southwest England. Publications include Politics of Performance (1992), Radical in Performance (1999), Theatre Ecology (2007) and Research Methods in Theatre and Performance (2011: with Helen Nicholson

 

 

Contact Information

Please send your abstracts or any enquiries to the Theme administrator, Alex, at performance.real@otago.ac.nz.

Contact Email
performance.real@otago.ac.nz