Proposed Course
Performing the Ancient Other; Representing the Modern Self
“[Recently] theatres of widely differing cultures have engaged in an ever-increasing tendency to adopt elements of foreign theatre traditions into their own productions.” E. Fischer-Lichte in The Intercultural Performance Reader (1996): 27
“It is possible to consider the theatre in terms of ethnical, national, group, or even individual traditions. But if in doing so one seeks to comprehend one’s own identity, it is also essential to take the opposite and complementary point of view: to think of one’s own theatre in a transcultural dimension, in the flow of a ‘tradition of traditions’” E. Barba in The Intercultural Performance Reader (1996): 218
Rationale:
Intercultural theater is drama which either in its conception, content, or techniques self-consciously borrows elements from a "foreign" culture. Often experimental in nature, intercultural dramatic productions have among theater practitioners and critics become central to debates about ethnicity and identity. This course focuses on the complex issues of ethnicity and identity by looking at the dynamic interplay between representations of the "other" and of the "self" -- or put in typically post-modern jargon, at the feedback between the fractured re-performances of identity. How do theater practitioners, both ancient and modern, appropriate other cultures? What does this cultural appropriation (/influence /transmission /borrowing /stealing) demonstrate about the similarities and differences between ancient and modern theatrical practices and the societies that produced such "intercultural" dramatic artifacts?
We will focus on intercultural theatrical practice in both ancient (particularly classical Greek) and modern (particularly contemporary American) contexts and compare the modes of cultural appropriation and self-definition shared or divergent in each theatrical tradition. How does the ancient Greek negotiation of culture compare to theatrical presentations of interculturalism in American theater of the past century? The relationship between these two poles, ancient Greece and contemporary America, provide an additional layer of discussion since together they demonstrate one aspect of the complex negotiation of culture over time: The recent construction (i.e. 18th century) of ancient Greece as the source of western culture and the even more recent deconstruction of such cultural positioning provide a fertile entry for discussion. In addition, the Greek classics are often used in the modern negotiation of eastern and western theater (i.e. as the first truly "western" theater) and thus provide another way to look at the definitions of "west" and "east", and native and foreign culture..
Theorists and practitioners disagree greatly over how to classify or describe recent “inter-“ “multi-“ or “trans-“ cultural performances. Is it really a genre? What purpose does its generic definition serve? How can one term capture all the variation? While keeping an eye on these debates, this course will start by looking at the main points of contention in defining intercultural theater: i.e. culture, performance, temporal relationship, and (sometimes) gender. How do statements about gender interact with statements about culture? How do cultural borrowings assert temporal relationships? The readings and performances have thus been chosen to speak to different aspects of the “intercultural,” although many items will speak to all these concerns. Viewing ancient and modern dramas through these various intercultural lenses (culture, performance, time, gender), will highlight crucial characteristics of both ancient Greek drama and modern American theater.
Class Requirements:
Class Participation (50%): The simplest part of class: Attend class and talk about the readings and performances.
Writing Assignments (30%): During the quarter, you must write four informal two-page papers in response to the readings. These assignments can be handed in anytime during the week of the reading which you are focusing on. Try to find something specific to talk about since each paper is relatively short. These papers are intended to help you digest and internalize the material better. With this purpose in mind, consider mixing up your writings: do one or two on a reading assignment that you really like, but try to do at least one on something you really did not like or had difficulty understanding on an initial reading.
Theater Report (20%): Go to a performance during the quarter and write up a brief analysis. Spend about 5 or 6 pages describing the performance and fitting it into some of the themes we have discussed during the course. How did issues of identity, ethnicity, nationalism (i.e. modern ethnicity), culture, or interculturalism figure into the play? What was the performance style? Was it culturally marked? What was the audience like? How would you characterize the relationship between the performers and the audience?
Research Paper (for 5 units): 10 to 12 pages, the paper can be on any subject related to the material covered in class. This paper is due at the end of the quarter but you should speak to me before the second week if you are considering taking the course for 5 units.
Class Books
Euripides. Bacchae (Lattimore trans.)
Euripides. Medea (Lattimore trans.)
Aeschylus. Persians (Lattimore trans.)
Sophocles. Oedipus at Colonus (Lattimore, trans.)
Aristophanes. Acharnians (Henderson, trans.)
Terence Adelphoe (Slavitt, trans.)
Suzuki. The Way of Acting
Breuer, L. The Gospel at Colonus
Wilson, A. Joe Turner’s Come and Gone
Mamet, D. American Buffalo
CR = Course Reader
Optional Reading:
Pavis, P. The Intercultural Performance Reader (1996)
Fischer-Lichte, E. The Show and the Gaze of Theatre: A European Perspective (1997)
Gilbert, H. and Tompkins, J. Post-Colonial Drama: Theory, Practice, Politics (1996)
Barba, E. and Savarese, N. A Dictionary of Theatre Anthropology: The Secret Art of the Performer (1991)
Brandon, J. R. The Cambridge Guide to Asian Theatre (1997)
Moy, J. S. Marginal Sights: Staging the Chinese in America (1993)
Said, E. The Edward Said Reader (2000)
Artaud, A. Theatre and its Double (particularly "On the Balinese Theatre" and "Oriental and Occidental Theatre")
Marranca, B. and Dasgupta, G. Interculturalism and Performance: Writings from PAJ (1991)
Huxley, M. and Witts, N. The Twentieth-Century Performance Reader
Schechner, R. and Appel, W. By Means of Performance. Intercultural studies of theatre and ritual (1990)
Schedule
Week 1 / Double VisionTuesday: / Introduction
Thursday: / Euripides’ Bacchae
CR: Goldhill, ‘The Great Dionysia and Civic Ideology’ in Nothing to Do with Dionysus?
Week 2 /
Tragic! --Greeks and Barbarians
Tuesday: / Euripides: MedeaCR: Hall, Inventing the Barbarian, p. 1-19; 47-55; 201-223
Thursday: / Aeschylus: Persians
CR: Herodotus Histories 3.97-3.160
Week 3 / Making fun of the Bar-bar-barians
Tuesday: / Aristophanes: Acharnians
CR: T. Long, Barbarians in Greek Comedy, p. 157-167 (Chapter 7: ‘Chronological Survey and Theoretical Conclusion’)
CR: Anonymous Mime fragment in Greek Literary Papyri III, p 336-349
Thursday: / Terence, Adelphoe
CR: Menander, fragments
CR: R. Hunter "Introduction" in The New Comedy of Greece and Rome
film (optional) / A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum
Week 4 / Towards the Present
Tuesday: / CR: Soyinka, The Bacchae of Euripides
CR: Cambridge Companion to Greek Tragedy, p. 228-283
Thursday: / CR: Barton, selections from Tantalus (Odysseus, Neoptolemus)
CR: Walcott, The Odyssey
CR: Living Greek Theatre, p. 355 – 381 (Revival: North America)
film / The Gospel at Colonus
Week 5 /
Classical Re-visioning
Tuesday: / Sophocles: Oedipus at ColonusL. Breuer: The Gospel at Colonus
Thursday: / Suzuki, 3-24; 47-68; 121ff (Clytemnestra)
Meeting / Meet with me by the end of the week to discuss paper topic and other assignments
Week 6 / Cultural Capital
Tuesday: / CR: ‘The Evolving Canon in a Video Age’ from What Is a Classic?
CR: Clifford, The Predicament of Culture, p. 189-214. (‘Histories of the Tribal and the Modern’)
Thursday: / CR: Hansen and Heath, Who Killed Homer?, p. xiii – xxiii; 1-80, 157-60
Week 7 / Inter- Trans- Meta- Ultra- cultural
Tuesday: / CR: Barba in Intercultural Performance Reader, p. 217-222
CR: ‘Nostalgia’ in Dictionary of Theatre Anthropology: The Secret Art of the Performer
CR: Weber in Interculturalism and Performance, p. 27-37
Thursday: / CR: Yeats, The Dreaming of the Bones
CR: Hwang, M. Butterfly
Week 8 / Identity Yourself! Act 1
Tuesday: / August Wilson: Joe Turner’s Come and Gone
Thursday: / Suzan-lori Parks: The American Play
CR: Valdez: Los Vendidos
Film / Gilbert and Sullivan: Mikado
Week 9 / Identify Yourself! Act 2
Tuesday: / CR: Geiogamah: Foghorn
CR: Taylor: The Baby Blues
Thursday: / CR: Sondheim: Pacific Overtures
CR: Verdi: Aida
CR: Gilbert and Sullivan: Mikado
Week 10 / Time
Tuesday: / Mamet: American Buffalo
CR: Taylor: Toronto at Dreamer’s Rock
CR: Harrison: The Trackers of Oxyrhynchus
Thursday: / Conclusions / Questions