Performance Design
Performance Design - Essay nr° 1
A multifaceted subject : Performance Design
Performance Design is a very inclusive subject which involves and interacts with several other academic fields. But more specifically, what is this discipline about and how can we better define it? In the following essay, I will briefly scrutinize the complex sphere of performance studies by taking into account some of the theories from the first theory course of Performance Design and some practical examples from our everydayʼs life.
The concept of performance has undergone a significant revolution over the last decades, from dealing exclusively with dramaturgy to assuming a more compound and elaborate connotation that is nowadays used and discussed interdisciplinary. " (...) Teachers and students are seeking two better understand this notion of performance as a means to gain a deeper understanding of their own fields of study, as well as a pedagogical method. The buzz over performance is nearly everywhere in the academy (...) " 1
At the present time, the anthropologist Victor Turner and the dramaturge Richard Schechner are considered the central protagonists in the expansion of the latest and deeper notion of performance. Turner has with his anthropological approach produced a model that divides performances in three different categories: cultural performance, social performance and social drama. Cultural performance includes traditional events such as plays, parades, masquerades and carnivals, yet
1
Madison&Hamera, 2006: compendium p.24
it could also involve formal rituals such as solemn ceremonies like weddings and funerals. Social Performance consists of those events one conducts everyday, such as talking a walk, shaking hands and cheering at a party.2 Lastly, the third type of performances are categorized under the label Social Drama, meaning those happenings which occur when there is a break, a
so-called breach in society 's normative practices. 3
A multifaceted subject : Performance Design
Performance Design is a very inclusive subject which involves and interacts with several other academic fields. But more specifically, what is this discipline about and how can we better define it? In the following essay, I will briefly scrutinize the complex sphere of performance studies by taking into account some of the theories from the first theory course of Performance Design and some practical examples from our everydayʼs life.
The concept of performance has undergone a significant revolution over the last decades, from dealing exclusively with dramaturgy to assuming a more compound and elaborate connotation that is nowadays used and discussed interdisciplinary. " (...) Teachers and students are seeking two better understand this notion of performance as a means to gain a deeper understanding of their own fields of study, as well as a pedagogical method. The buzz over performance is nearly everywhere in the academy (...) " 1
At the present time, the anthropologist Victor Turner and the dramaturge Richard Schechner are considered the central protagonists in the expansion of the latest and deeper notion of performance. Turner has with his anthropological approach produced a model that divides performances in three different categories: cultural performance, social performance and social drama. Cultural performance includes traditional events such as plays, parades, masquerades and carnivals, yet
1
Madison&Hamera, 2006: compendium p.24
it could also involve formal rituals such as solemn ceremonies like weddings and funerals. Social Performance consists of those events one conducts everyday, such as talking a walk, shaking hands and cheering at a party.2 Lastly, the third type of performances are categorized under the label Social Drama, meaning those happenings which occur when there is a break, a
so-called breach in society 's normative practices. 3
Bibliography: - Barbara Kirschenblatt-Gimblett: Performance Studies 1999 - Victor Turner: ”Introduction”. I: From Ritual to Theatre. The Human Seriousness of Play. New York. - D. Soyini Madison & Judith Hamera: Performance Studies at the Intersections. I: The SAGE handbook of Performance Studies. 2006 - Richard Schechner: Toward a Poetics of Performance. I: Performance Theory. 2003.