Performance Studies International

While work progresses on the Copenhagen and Zagreb conferences, the Dwight Conquergood Award has been given priority in recent weeks. Gunhild and her team have focussed on raising the profile of this award this year and I am very happy to report that in only its second year the award is now attracting a great deal of interest and we have received a large number of applications. The award exists to honour the memory of Dwight Conquergood and his contribution to performance scholarship and to Performance Studies international by promoting the work of ‘an artist, an activist or an emerging academic conducting research or working on projects with disenfranchised communities’. This is one of the key areas of PSi activity and the board’s fund raising efforts are directed primarily towards enhancing this area of our work as an organization.

While there are a number of institutions still finalizing their commitments for 2008 in terms of sponsorship I would like to thank the following sponsoring institutions who have confirmed their support for 2008: The Central School of Speech and Drama at the University of London; and The School of Theatre, Performance and Cultural Policy Studies at the University of Warwick. This support will enable us to offer multiple awards for 2008 and to start to consider further strategic developments in PSi’s operations.

I would also like to thank all those who have applied this year and also take this opportunity to assure you that we will process these as soon as we can but due to the volume of material we will not be able to give an indication of support as soon as we had indicated in earlier messages. We aim to complete the process in the next few weeks and to announce the winners in the next digest.

Best wishes to you all,

Edward Scheer
President, PSi

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2. From PSi # 14 in Copenhagen

Read all abstracts for the conference!

All abstracts for the forthcoming Interregnum conference are now available at the website www.interregnum.dk, under Programme. There are two lists, one for panels that are already formed, these are in alphabetical order after the title of the panel. The other list contains individual abstracts (or from two persons giving a presentation together). Individual presentations will be placed in panels together, or announced as a performance. This will be done in due course.

All biographical statements we have received will also be appearing on the website under Programme very soon.

A preliminary programme for the conference will appear at the beginning of June.

Registration
You can register for the conference now at the website www.interregnum.dk
under Registration. Please note that you need to register and pay for the conference.

After June 1st the registration fee will go up, so make sure you register before that date.

hyPerform
Be sure to visit hyPerform, the Interregnum web gallery, at www.hyperform.dk

Gunhild Borggreen
Conference organiser
Interregnum PSi # 14
Department of Arts and Cultural Studies
University of Copenhagen
Karen Blixens Vej 1
DK-2300 Copenhagen S
Denmark

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3. PSi #15 First Announcement

The fifteenth PSi conference, Misperformance: Misfiring, Misfitting, Misreading, will take place in Zagreb, Croatia, June 24 – 28 2009. It is being hosted by the Centre for Drama Art as the main organizer and several other research and cultural institutions: Faculty of Philosophy and Academy of Drama Arts (Dramaturgy Department) of the University of Zagreb, Teatar &TD and Student Centre of the University of Zagreb and Institute for Ethnology and Folklore Studies.

The Organizing committee decided to propose a new format of the conference that would combine both traditional and various non-conventional, open and flexible models of presenting, discussing and performing. While in the morning and early afternoon conference participants will be presenting their papers within the framework of panels, in the evening and night they will be invited to participate in the program of – shifts. Shifts are designed to accomplish a higher level of interaction between the participants of the conference and especially between artistic and theoretical work. A shift will accommodate a wide range of formats, such as various kinds of performative presentations, round-table discussions about presented performances, workshops, interactive events, seminars, and even mini-symposia. Each shift will have its own curator or a group of curators or conveners.

The Zagreb PSi conference web site will be up and calls for papers, panels and shifts will be released in the beginning of June 2008.

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CALLS FOR PAPERS (CONFERENCES AND PUBLICATIONS)

4. CfP: Association of Theatre Movement Educators – Pre-conference to ATHE, July 30-31 2008, Denver, US (due May 1)

Registration form and information about the Guest Artists are available on the website: www.atmeweb.org

Call and Submission Instructions for DVD and Workshop Presentations, and Papers

The Association of Theatre Movement Educators (ATME) invites you to submit a DVD presentation of your creative process, a proposal for a paper, or a teaching presentation for the ATME 2008 Pre-Conference. Submissions will be screened by a committee. Presentations will be selected and scheduled as best serves the general topic of the Pre-Conference. Proposals for papers and teaching presentations should be within the general topic of the Pre-Conference addressing the following topics:

Preparation – A Workshop/Paper presentation
Papers (10 Minutes) and teaching presentations (30 Minutes) under this heading may include (but are not limited to):
- How do you choose those you want to work with?
- How do you train those you want to work with? Is this important or is your value the uniqueness of each contributor?
- A warm up for getting participants ready for the creative process. Or how to create a specific warm up for specific shows, such as a period styles production etc.
- What kind of trainings do performers possess for particular companies or how do artists prepare performers to be the ‘clay’ that the creative artist wants to shape?

The Creative Process Papers and/or DVD presentations under this heading may include (but are not limited to):
- A person or persons who have published a book, or written on this topic, or wish to offer a presentation of the resource material available on the topic of creativity and creation.

Training Creators and Performing Artists –
Papers and/or DVD and teaching presentations under this heading may include (but are not limited to):
- How are/aren’t we training creators and performers as creative artists?

Creative ‘Sites’
Papers and teaching presentations under this heading may include (but are not limited to):
- Are our university departments ‘sites’ that nurture the creative process? How can we foster this?
- How do we work with our faculty/colleagues creatively?
- Current or historical creative ‘sites,’ be they schools like Dell Arte, the Lecoq school, etc, or companies like Theatre du Soleil.

Submission Guidelines

The format of the colloquium will include: 30 minute DVD presentations of your work and discussion of your creative process. Paper presentations will be limited to 10 minutes. Submissions for DVD presentations and papers should include title of DVD presentation or paper, contact information, presentation needs (space, technology, handouts, etc.), and a 250 word abstract describing the DVD presentation or paper. Teaching presentations will be limited to 30 minutes. Submissions for teaching presentations should include title of presentation, contact information, presentation needs (space, technology, etc.), and a 250 word abstract describing the presentation. All proposals should be submitted directly to Deborah Robertson drobertson@niu.edu or 615 Joanne Lane, DeKalb, Illinois 60115, by the submission deadline of May 1, 2008. Notification of acceptance will be May 20, 2008. If not currently a member of ATME at the time of submitting a proposal, all presenters must be members at the time of presentation.

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5. CfSubmissions: Shakespeare Symposium – Aug 4-6 2008, Southern Utah U, US (due May 1)

Cedar City, Utah

The Wooden O Symposium is a cross disciplinary conference that will explore Early Modern studies through the text and performance of Shakespeare's plays. Scholars from all disciplines are encouraged to submit papers that offer insights and new ideas springing from the works of William Shakespeare. Priority for papers/presentations will be given to research relating to one or more of these specific works: Shakespeare's The Two Gentlemen of Verona, Othello, and The Taming of the Shrew.

The Wooden O Symposium is hosted by Southern Utah University, home of the Tony Award-winning Utah Shakespearean Festival, which will be presenting The Two Gentlemen of Verona, Othello, and The Taming of the Shrew during its 2008 summer season. Conference participants will have the unique opportunity of immersing themselves in research, text and performance in one of the most beautiful settings in the western U.S.

Deadline Extended: May 1, 2008

Submissions must include:
250 word abstract or complete paper
author's name
participant category (faculty, graduate student, undergraduate, aficionado)
mailing address
college/university affiliation (if any)
email address
daytime phone number.
Send submissions to:
Wooden O Symposium
c/o Utah Shakespearean Festival
351 West Center Street
Cedar City, UT 84720
wooden@suu.org
Fax: 435-865-8169

For more information visit www.woodenosymposium.org or call 435-586-7880.

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6. CfP: ‘Bodies of Evidence / Bodies as Evidence’ – TaPRA Theatre History and Historiography Working Group, TaPRA Conference, Sept 3-5 2008, U of Leeds, UK (due May 5)Proposals for papers on the theme of ‘Bodies of Evidence/ Bodies as Evidence’ are invited for discussion at the 2008 conference. What is a body of evidence? By what process is it perceived to accumulate around a significant event, phenomenon, structure or mechanism in theatre history? How is it constructed or identified historiographically, and what happens if the body of evidence constructed by one generation of historians is then reconfigured and renegotiated by another? In contemplating the material remains which historians traditionally rely on to supply evidence, what is the place of the subjective or imaginary response? What is the place of disciplinary or technological innovation in re-imagining, re-visioning and thus possibly re-experiencing the ‘body’ of long-vanished evidence? Finally how can the human body itself - whether in contemporary practical exploration and testing, or in the visual representation or verbal recollection of the lived experience of past performance - be considered a site of evidence?

These and other questions may be debated in papers of no more than four thousand words which should be completed and circulated to members of the group no later than two weeks before the meeting. As has been the practice hitherto, participants may use material from individual research projects to illustrate their argument, but should be aware that the purpose of the group is to consider wider historiographic concerns about methods and models of historical discourse. Short position or problem papers are acceptable, as are papers written by research students who wish to test the viability of proposed research questions.

Please send brief proposals (max 500 words) to the Working Group Convenors, Claire Cochrane (c.cochrane@worc.ac.uk) and Jo Robinson (Joanna.Robinson@nottingham.ac.uk) by 5 May 2008.

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7. CfP: Scenography Working Group, TaPRA Conference, Sept 3-5 2008, U of Leeds, UK (due May 5)

Researchers interested in scenography are invited to make proposals for contributions to the conference in response to one of three themes :

The ethics of scenography
What does ethics mean in context of scenography?

* What are the social, political or economic dimensions of scenography? Does the, as Alan Read claims, a concentration on the 'vision' of theatre hinder the ethical dimension of theatre? How does the reception of scenography connect to ethical concerns? What is the efficacy of scenography and how does it make a difference to the ways we view the world? How do practices of scenography, past and present, articulate Christopher Baugh's observation that scenography is an expression of a relationship with the world which reflects 'complex human values and beliefs'.

* Scenography as spectacle has been both celebrated and criticised. Can scenography that dazzles and delights be more than just gratuitous consumption? Colin Counsell has called Robert Wilson's work hollow in its ' literal incarnation of capital'. Is scenographic practice synonymous with extravagance and indulgence? What is 'sustainable' practice in scenography?

Scenographic practice and research
In what ways might practice and research in scenography productively interact?

* How do we effectively document practice-based scenographic research? Where is the knowledge, how is it shared, with and for whom? What is the value of the documentation of scenographic practice (for example as seen at the Prague Quadrennial and currently at the Collaborators exhibition at the V&A) for/as research?
* What is the interface between academic and professional idioms in scenography? How do we describe and analyse practice? How does theory make meaningful interventions in scenographic practice and vice versa?

Scenography , Performance and the Body

We also intend to run a shared session with the Performance and the Body working group. Their mission statement is below:

Although the 'body' has been key to critical discourses since the 1980s, the impact of such discourses on understandings of the performing body has been limited. While 'the performative' has become a key metaphor for examinations of bodies in the social domain, the specificity of performance and its frames, the ways these impact on the actions of and reactions to the soma, have received far less critical attention. The group therefore recognises that there is still substantial research to be undertaken, especially in relation to interrogating cultural form.

Accordingly, proposals are invited for papers which address intersections between scenography and the performing body.

Proposals
Please send a 300 word summary for either a workshop* (max 45mins activity) or a paper/presentation (max 20 mins) to:

Joslin McKinney j.e.mckinney@leeds.ac.uk and Nick Moran n.moran@cssd.ac.uk by 5th May 2008

* please include the space/technical resources you would need for a workshop

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8. CfP: Applied and Social Theatre Working Group – TaPRA Conference, Sept 3-5 2008, U of Leeds, UK (due May 5)

The Theatre and Performance Research Association (TaPRA, www.tapra.org), will hold its 4th Annual Conference at the University of Leeds from September 3-5, 2008.

Please find below the working group statement and call for papers for the Applied and Social Theatre Working Group.

Working Group Statement:

This working group is concerned with the application of drama and theatre to community, educational and therapeutic settings. Interest in the efficacy of theatre-making in such contexts has grown in the last twenty years, raising new questions about the role of universities in shaping social policy and in the wider community. The working group was established to raise questions about the ethics of practice and research in applied and social theatre, and the relationship between practice, research and teaching in this aspect of scholarly inquiry.

The working group intends to offer a forum for those engaged in research and practice that is orientated towards social change to discuss the implications of practice, particularly in contexts where they may be cultural outsiders. The working group has a strong interest in work that takes place internationally, as well as recognising the complexity of community.

Applied and Social Theatre 2008: New Directions

For TaPRA 2008 we invite contributions that respond in any way to the working group’s statement above. For 2008, we are interesting in exploring new directions, and hope to welcome emergeny scholars as well as experienced researchers. Applied Theatre is experiencing unprecedented academic interest, with researchers asking provocative questions of the diverse practices that takes place in different community and institutional contexts. New directions in applied, social and community-based performance are emerging from new research ecologies, methodologies and forms of engagement with participants. The working group aims to capture these innovations.

Broad, creative and flexible interpretations of the theme are welcome from researchers in all aspects of applied performance, social drama and community theatre. The following are offered as examples of questions that might stimulate discussion about new directions in applied theatre research, and raise debates about the significance of performance in civic and community life:

How are researchers in applied theatre reflecting on notions of the ethical? Are concerns for ethical practice taking the place of political activism?
How are researchers theorising ideas of voice?
What questions are raised by practitioners involved in cross/ inter/ intra cultural research?
What are the aesthetic challenges faced by applied theatre and how might they be researched?
How might research interrogate concepts of theatricality and performativity?
How are researchers in applied theatre connecting with questions of community?

It is proposed that there will be two strands to the working group. Part of the conference will be dedicated to research papers of around 15 minutes, followed by discussion. We will also allow for short provocations of a maximum of 5 minutes that will prompt discussion and debate. Where appropriate these will be collected in thematically connected ‘panels’.

At TaPRA 2008 the Performance, Identity, Community working group will be offering at least one shared panel with the Applied Theatre and Performance working group to explore areas of intersection and convergence.

Please send a brief (250 word) proposal and a brief biographical statement by Monday the 5th of May to either James Thompson, james.thompson@manchester.ac.uk or Helen Nicholson, h.nicholson@rhul.ac.uk

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9. CfP: Performance and the Body Working Group – TaPRA Conference, Sept 3-5 2008, U of Leeds, UK (due May 5)

Working Group Statement

Although the “body” has been key to critical discourses since the 1980s, the impact of such discourses on understandings of the performing body has been limited. While “the performative” has become a key metaphor for examinations of bodies in the social domain, the specificity of performance and its frames, the ways these impact on the actions of and reactions to the soma, have received far less critical attention. This working group therefore recognises that there is still substantial research to be undertaken, especially in relation to interrogating cultural form(s). Areas for consideration include: historically based readings of the body (including the gendered, racial, sexualised and politically radical body); group or ensemble collections of the body in performance; the individual body as testament; the virtual body; and, the disciplined (rehearsed) body.

Call for Papers for 2008 Conference

For TaPRA 2008, the working group invites papers exploring the following two themes. In both cases, proposals for performative papers are welcome but must be achievable with limited resources.

Please send a brief (250 word) proposal, a short biographical statement, and an outline of technical requirements by Monday, 5 May to Colin Counsell (c.counsell@londonmet.ac.uk) and Roberta Mock (roberta.mock@plymouth.ac.uk).

1) The Sited Body
We welcome proposals for 20 minute papers that respond creatively and rigorously to the working group’s statement above, especially research that interrogates the potential relationships between performance, body and site. Some slippage between ‘siting’, ‘sighting’, and ‘citing’ is expected. Those expressing an interest in this theme may wish to consider:

- the body as site of performance
- the impact of performance space and environment on the body
- regionality and locality and the body
- the role of the body in site-specific and site-generic performance
- performance, embodiment and “non-place”
- the body’s negotiation of public and private spheres in performance
- the body as palimpsest
- landscape, topography, mapping and embodiment
- the performing body in institutional spaces
- embodying historical and cultural contexts as sites of performance
- the body beyond site: absent, projected, disembodied, mediatized, erased.

2) Scenography, Performance and the Body

In addition, we intend to run a shared session with the Scenography working group to foster exchange and dialogue. Accordingly, proposals are invited for papers which address intersections between scenography and the performing body.

Our working group also warmly welcomes participants who do not wish to present a paper this year.

For more about the TaPRA conference, including the other working group calls for papers, details of the postgraduate student bursaries, and the themed open session, please visit www.tapra.org<http://www.tapra.org/>.

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10. CfP: Drama-Screen Exchanges – TaPRA Conference, Sept 3-5 2008, U of Leeds, UK (due May 5)

We are asking for 250 word (max) proposals with brief biography and resource needs by 5th May 2008 to the convenors:
Dr Kara McKechnie (k.mckechnie@leeds.ac.uk)
Prof Stephen Lacey (swlacey@glam.ac.uk)

Please feel free to have a conversation with the convenors as you consider what you might offer for the working group sessions. Our group also welcomes participants who do not wish to present a paper or provocation.

There are 3 possible areas for presentation and discussion, based on the inaugural meeting in Birmingham, Sept 07, which have the potential to inter-connect. Our group is particularly interested in cross- and inter-disciplinary contributions.

1) Representing the 'real'

Representations of the 'real' of social reality on stage and on the small screen has been a recurrent concern of play/programme makers, critics and audiences. Although the same words are often used - documentary, documentary-drama (dramadoc) - there are also differences (the present currency of 'verbatim theatre', for example) which suggest that different practices may be in play. Also, competing conceptions of realism remain important to both media. Additionally, the original debates around documentary-drama (in British television), documentary theatre and realism were formed in a period of political certainties, often informed by a Marxist cultural model (if not an explicit Marxist politics), and in these postmodern (if not post-postmodern) times it is appropriate to review these debates and how they have played out subsequently across both media.

Areas of interest for papers and provocations might engage with, but need not be limited to, the following:

* Conventions of documentary formats for stage and screen; similarities, differences, influences.
* Notions of the 'real', 'fact' and 'truth' within documentary formats
* Ethics/ responsibilities
* Recognising context - models of engagement with history and with specific groups.
* Questions of performance and practice (e.g. actor training for documentary formats).

2) Issues in Adaptation

Questions around adaptation - definitions, boundaries, whether it constitutes a distinct field of study, whatever media are involved, for example - have risen up the critical agenda in recent years (see the recent launch of the new Intellect Journal, Journal of Adaptation in Film and Performance and the associated conference in June 08 at the University of Glamorgan). Adaptation has always been important to both theatre and television, particularly in the post-1945 context, and many of the debates that are emerging across cultural forms are to be found in a particularly sharp form in these media. The development of new media, supported by the pluralism and eclecticism of contemporary cultural theory, has ensured that 'adaptation' remains a dominant and hybrid practice.

With this in mind, papers and provocations are invited that might engage with, but should not be limited to, the following:

* Conventions and practices: negotiating different representational traditions and genres (eg costume-drama, the literary adaptation, the biographical drama, a Brechtian dialogue with history).
* Narrative forms: the re-working of source narratives in a new context; the challenge to the linear narrative; varieties of montage.
* Adaptation in, or from, applied/ community contexts: adapting a draft script to the demands of the context, the stakeholders and the performers during production period.
* Circulating stories: tracing texts across media, especially in relation to the way that audience knowledge is addressed (eg negotiating the 'faithfulness' debate).
* Questions of performance: adapting to industry demands.
* Media literacy, its meaning and its uses for theatre and performance.
* The impact of new media on television and theatre in relation to adaptations (eg the emphasis on 'cross-platform content' rather than 'programmes' in current TV-talk).

3) Acting on stage and screen

Whilst a strong critical interest in questions of acting (and performance generally) has characterised the study of theatre, acting on television has received much less attention. This is being remedied (see the AHRC project in actor-training for documentary theatre and television at the University of Reading), but there is considerable scope to do more. This may be partly a matter of adapting critical models from the theatre to the study of television, but it should not be simply a one-way traffic. Given that many young actors now find their first employment on television, and that most work across both media as a matter of course, what, for example, are the differences between acting for the screen and stage?

Papers and provocations might wish to engage with, but should not be limited to, the following:

* Exploring rehearsal and production processes in theatre and television
* Questions of scale and intimacy in acting for both media
* Playing 'real people'; responsibilities and protocols.
* Models of analysis - how do we talk about acting?

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11. CfP: ‘Carnvial, “People’s Art” and Taking Back the Streets’ – July 30-Aug 3 2008, U of Toronto, Canada (due May 15)

Accolade Centre at York University & Koffler Student Centre at University of Toronto
www.CarnivalConference.ca

Spreading from Trinidad through the Caribbean, to Brazil, the United States and Canada, England, as well as Germany, and with analogues in Brazil, the United States and elsewhere, Carnival has developed into one of the most important global expressions of popular identity. Both as celebration, and as resistance art, it builds on the collision of cultures of Christian European colonizers and enslaved West Africans. The claiming of public space in the use of the street is a statement of presence that is as much political as artistic. Organized to coincide with the Caribana Festival on the streets of Toronto, this conference addresses such important issues as Globalization and Commercialization, the formation of Diasporas, the origins and development of Carnival, Gender and Racism, the nature of Postcolonialism today.

Held as part of the Caribana Festival and Parade, and with the International Steelpan Association, the conference encourages merging theory with practice

The conference will explore the social, political and cultural aspects of Carnival and street theatre, as well as themes of exclusion/otherness, exoticism and cross-cultural acceptance, connections across the Diaspora, and comparisons between Carnival in Africa, the Caribbean, South and North America, Europe and the UK. Papers that address any aspect of these areas are welcome. While taking African Carnival and its spread across the Caribbean to other continents as its base, this conference is also intended to focus on the widest socio-cultural aspects of this performative street art: the negotiation of hybrid identity in the post-colonial context; anthropological views of historical developments, the politics of carnival and street theatre, the economics and commercial pressures.

Suggested topics for papers include, but are not limited to:
- Carnival and theatricality
- Images of Africa / Carnival in Africa
- The Trinidad Carnival Tradition
- Myth, Magic and Ritual
- Economics and Carnival
- Social Activism & Street Theatre
- Popular Art, Globalization & Copyright
- Gender, Sexuality, Satire
- Caribana: history, performance
- New Orleans Mardi Gras
- Cross-Cultural Influence: Brazil, Bolivia, Berlin
- Notting Hill Carnival

There are seminars for which papers may be submitted, on the following topics:
- Cultural Rights in a Transnational Festival
- Carnival in Literature
- Anthropological Approaches to Carnival

There is also still the opportunity to propose other seminar topics

Submissions:
Prospective participants should submit abstracts of between 100 and 300 words, for individual papers, seminars or workshops, by the FINAL deadline of MAY 15th 2008. Abstracts should be sent by email to carnival@yorku.ca. Abstracts must include the title of the paper or presentation, the name(s) of presenter(s); institutional affiliation; email address, phone & Fax numbers. Students should identify themselves as New Scholars.

Special Features:
Presentation of a performance piece by Eintou Springer
- Major Exhibition of Carnival Art
- Kings and Queens Competition and Caribana Parade
- Steelpan Music and Panels
- Presentation of Carnival Videos
Workshops on:
- Producing Carnival
- Carnival Design
- Street Theatre
- Calypso

CONTACT: Prof. Christopher Innes, Canada Research Chair, 125 Winters College, York University

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12. CfP: Journal of Religion and Theatre (due May 15)

Journal of Religion and Theatre Call for Papers and Reviews

The deadline for article submissions to the Journal of Religion and Theatre has been extended to May 15, 2008.

The Journal of Religion and Theatre is a peer-reviewed journal. The journal aims to provide descriptive and analytical articles examining the spirituality of world cultures in all disciplines of the theatre, performance studies in sacred rituals of all cultures, themes of transcendence in text, on stage, in theatre history, the analysis of dramatic literature, and other topics relating to the relationship between religion and theatre. The journal also aims to facilitate the exchange of knowledge throughout the theatrical community concerning the relationship between theatre and religion, and serves as an academic research resource for the benefit of all interested scholars and artists.

For submission guidelines and past issues, please consult our website at:

http://www.rtjournal.org.

We have two books currently available for review. The titles are:
A Jesuit Off-Broadway by James Martin, S.J.
Rabinal Achi: A Fifteenth Century Maya Dynastic Drama, by Alain Breton

If you would like to review one of these titles, please contact the general editor, Heather Beasley, at Heather.Beasley@colorado.edu with a copy of your CV and a short note on your interest in the book. The editor will respond with book review guidelines if you are selected.

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13. Cf Articles: ‘Playing Politics: Performance, Community and Social Change’ – About Performance #9 2009 (due May 20)

About Performance is a peer reviewed journal published by the Department of Performance Studies at the University of Sydney. Each issue of the journal is devoted to a single theme and the journal appears once a year in June/July. The 2009 issue of About Performance will be co-edited by Paul Dwyer and Gay McAuley and its title is ‘Playing Politics: Performance, Community and Social Change.’

A great deal of performance studies scholarship has revolved around the concepts of ‘social drama’, ‘liminal/liminoid’ experience, and the ‘efficacy’ of performance; there has been vigorous critique concerning the embodied politics of identity, the behaviour of ‘unruly perfomatives’, the ironies of ‘resistant’ postmodernism, post-colonial ‘mimicry’, border-crossing intercultural performances and much more besides. Are such dominant theoretical tropes still revealing as much as we might like about contemporary community-based performance practices, documentary/verbatim theatre, the dramaturgies of political protest or the performative ‘packaging’ of politicians and their policies?

The editors invite contributions that engage with these and other genres in order to theorise the nexus between performance and social change. We are particularly interested in articles that deal with a body of work rather than a single production, and in discussion of performance practices that emerge from sustained long- term relationships between particular performers, places and communities.

Proposals (200-300 words) are invited for articles dealing with any of the above areas of interest. Articles are normally between 6000 to 8000 words. Please send your proposal to The Editors, About Performance (Department of Performance Studies, University of Sydney, Sydney NSW 2006, Australia); or by email, either to gay.mcauley@usyd.edu.au or to paul.dwyer@usyd.edu.au and include a brief note giving your institutional affiliation, mailing and email addresses. Proposals should be sent by 20. May 2008 and we will notify you within a month whether the proposal has been accepted. The deadline for completed articles is 1. November 2008. Articles are submitted to a peer review process and any suggested revisions are to be completed by 1. February 2009. The journal will be published in June 2009.

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14. CfP: ‘Writing Encounters’ – Sept 11-14 2008, York St John U, UK (due May 23)

Writing Encounters invites proposals for papers, presentations, discussions, round tables, writing events and panel presentations, from researchers and artists across the expanded field of art, writing and performance.

Writing Encounters is an international symposium for writing artists, researchers, curators, producers and teachers who have an interest in the encounter between art, writing and performance, as well as the way in which writing's forms are currently changing in response to new technologies and social networks. The symposium will include performance events, an artists' bookshop, film screenings, curated conversations and workshops by invited artists, as well as papers, panels and presentations by scholars and curators. The curators invite proposals from artists and scholars that address contemporary and historical practices and traditions outside mainstream literary and performance practice, including writing as a performance event; writing as process; performance scripts and scores; language and performance poetry; inter/intralingual performance writing and translation, visual language; time-based and digital writing; artists' books and publishing; performative textual practices within fine art; notation and mark-making practices across the performance disciplines. Contributors are also invited to address critical discourses, approaches and debates that engage with the re-figured and re-imagined field of contemporary textual/visual/sonic performance.

Writing Encounters will also have a strong commitment to discussion about pedagogies of writing within the public arts and Higher Education sectors. Proceedings from the symposium will inform a special issue of the journal of Writing in Creative Practice to be edited by Susan Orr and Claire Hind.

Writing Encounters is a partnership between thespacebetweenwords, a York based collaborative network for writing artists, and York St. John University. Its curators are Claire MacDonald co-founder of the journal Performance Research, and Director of the International Centre for Fine Art Research at the University of the Arts London, and Claire Hind, Senior Lecturer in Performance at York St John University. The symposium is being co-produced by Rob Wilsmore of York St. John, and Simon Zimmerman freelance producer and director of the producing agency Roomman.

Proposals should be no more than 500 words and addressed to the curators at writingencounters@thespacebetweenwords.org

The deadline for proposals is Friday 23rd May. Decisions about inclusion in the symposium will be made by Friday 20th June.

To view the space between words website go to http://www.thespacebetweenwords.org/

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15. CfP: ‘Music and the Melodramatic Aesthetic’ – Sept 5-7 2008, U of Nottingham, UK (due May 31)

The early nineteenth-century stage genre of melodrama, as exemplified by Pixérécourt’s mélodrames à grand spectacle, expressed the moral struggle between good and evil through the interrelationship of music, speech, gesture and tableau in scenes of high emotion. This cross-disciplinary conference (Music, Theatre, Film, Art History, Philosophy) is the culmination of an AHRC-funded Research Workshop exploring melodrama as a performance process and an aesthetic, and tracing the nature of its influence on later nineteenth- and early twentieth-century lyric drama – including opera, ballet, pantomime and early sound and film recordings.

The keynote speaker will be Prof Jacqueline Waeber (Duke University).

Individual papers and session proposals are invited on (though not restricted to) the following topics:
- The gestural language of melodrama, opera, ballet, silent film
- Performance materials (including treatises, manuals, images, recordings)
- Gestural and musical clichés
- The high/low divide
- The communication process between actors/singers and audience
- Ethics and aesthetics
- The evolution of melodrama through the nineteenth century
- Tableaux
- Static/kinetic moments
- Gesture and movement in music
- Performative processes
- Excess
- Sonic/visual spectacle
- Body—voice—orchestra as locus of meaning
- Sound vs. image
- Cultural transfer

For more information on the Research Workshop (and the conference itself in due course) please visit www.nottingham.ac.uk/nottingham.ac.uk/music/mma

Please send proposals for 20-minute papers (max. 300 words) and/or 90- minute panel sessions to the conference organiser sarah.hibberd@nottingham.ac.uk by 31 May 2008. Please include your institutional details and email address. We aim to notify applicants within three weeks of this deadline. It is envisaged that a selection of papers will be published.

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16. CfP: ‘Music on Stage’ – Oct 18-19 2008, Rose Bruford College, UK (due May 31)

An international, interdisciplinary conference at Rose Bruford College, Sidcup, Kent
October 18th and 19th, 2008

This conference topic is intentionally wide in its appeal as it is hoped papers will cover all aspect of performance as well as the creation of the music, and its composers. The following strands are anticipated: historic performance practices; design; production; individual composers and works.

Papers are invited of 20 minutes duration (plus question time) and abstracts of 200 words should be sent to Dr F Jane Schopf at Fiona.schopf@bruford.ac.uk or Rose Bruford College, Burnt Oak Lane, Sidcup, Kent DA15 9DF, England Deadline May 31st 2008

Subject to peer review, paper will be published in the journal Studies in Musical Theatre (Intellect Press)

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17. CfP: ‘Golden Generation? Theatre Archive Project’ – Sept 8-9 2008, U of Sheffield, UK (due May 31)

The AHRC University of Sheffield British Library Theatre Archive Project is holding a conference at the British Library on the 8-9th September. This two day event represents the continuation of a five year Project which has sought to re-investigate post-war British Theatre between 1945-68. For further information about the Project please see our website http://www.bl.uk/theatrearchive.

We are going to be holding a new scholars forum across the two days and would like to invite papers from postgraduate students and entry level academics on any aspect of British Theatre between 1945-68. We are particularly keen to encourage proposals which fit in with the three strands of the Theatre Archive Project:

1. The British Library's post-war theatre archive collection which includes the archives of John Gielgud, Laurence Olivier, Michel Saint-Denis, and Ralph Richardson
2. The modern playscripts collection held at the British Library
3. The British Library Sound Archive/ Oral history and theatre history

Abstracts for papers should be no more than 150 words. Please send your proposals and any further queries regarding the new scholars forum to Kate Harris (k.harris@sheffield.ac.uk) and Tom Dymond (t.dymond@sheffield.ac.uk) by May 31st. Full details of the conference can be found at: http://www.sheffield.ac.uk/goldengeneration/

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18. CfP: ‘Futurist Dramaturgy and Performance’ – Nov 7-8 2008, U of Toronto, Canada (due June 30)

Sponsored by the University of Toronto’s Graduate Centre for Study of Drama
In collaboration with the Emilio Goggio Chair in Italian Studies, Centro di Studi «Aldo Palazzeschi» dell'Università di Firenze, and Instituto Italiano di Cultura - Toronto;

And with the support of Centre for Comparative Literature and Department of Language Studies, University of Toronto Mississauga

Anticipating the centenary of Filippo Tommaso Marinetti’s seminal cri du théâtre “The Foundation and Manifesto of Futurism,” papers examining theatrical aspects of Futurist performance and its associated dramaturgy are invited for a two-day conference at the University of Toronto, November 7 - 8, 2008. Revivals of staging and reception history of the movement will be of special interest.

Topics for consideration may include but are not limited to investigations of:

- Italian Futurism and symbolism
- Futurist dramaturgy of sound
- Futurism and traditional dramatic forms
- Influence and legacy of Futurism on European theatre
- Futurist revivals
- Futurist production techniques and conventions

Due: June 30, 2008
Papers are expected to be thirty minutes in length.
Please submit proposals (250 words) to Paul Stoesser stoesser@chass.utoronto.ca
(Copy in the body of the email, please)
All proposals should include the author's affiliation and full contact information.

Alternatively, submissions may be sent to the attention of

Dr. Paul J. Stoesser,
Conference Convenor,
Graduate Centre for Study of Drama,
University of Toronto,
214 College Street,
Toronto Ontario Canada M5T 2Z9.

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19. CfP: ‘Identity and Its Discontents’ – Nov 26-28 2008, U of Melbourne, Australia (due June 30)

Keynote speakers:
Dr Tony Birch (University of Melbourne)
Dr Debjani Ganguly (ANU)
Professor Ghassan Hage (University of Melbourne)

Call for Papers:

What does it mean to speak of identity?
Despite its popularity in academic discourse, identity is often insufficiently theorised. The purpose of this conference is to create the time and space to stop and think about identity, identities and their implications, effects and affects, their formation and performance, workings and failings, and the way in which identities intersect with our other analytical categories like gender, race and class, as well as nationality, religion, ethnicity, culture and sexuality. Our aim is to begin a conversation that explores, historicises and interrogates our concepts of identity.

Further questions we are interested in addressing include:
- How is identity materialised, articulated, embodied, lived and ritualised?
- How does one live out the identity of the colonised? The coloniser?
- How does one rebel against their identities, and can they be escaped?
- What are the effects of interactions with other groups, forced or voluntary?
- Who has the power to define what constitutes an individual's or group’s identity?
- Is there a power to living on the margins?
- How are identities shaped by emotions?
- How are identities shaped and lived on an individual and/or collective level?
- What roles do individual and collective memory play?
- What roles do language and representation play in shaping and reshaping identities?

We invite scholars with an interest in these or similar questions to propose a 20 minute paper. Proposals for sessions built around a theme are also welcomed.

Please send abstracts of 300 words, and a biography (max. 50 words) to identityanditsdiscontents@gmail.com, by June 30.

Conference convenors: Matthew Klugman, Claire McLisky, Jordy Silverstein, David Slucki, Melissa Walsh.

Supported by the School of Historical Studies, University of Melbourne.

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20. CfP: ‘Stuck in the Middle: The Mainstream and its Discontents’ – International Association for the Study of Popular Music (Australia and New Zealand branch), Nov 28-30 2008, Griffith U, Brisbane, Australia (due June 30)

Presented by the Centre for Public Culture and Ideas (CPCI) Griffith University, Brisbane, Australia

Whilst “cutting edge” and “alternative” music has played a central role in popular music studies, these terms depend upon being juxtaposed with a real or imagined “middle” or “mainstream.” The mainstream has often played the negative role in this relationship, against which the positive, resistant qualities of music subcultures have been measured. However, as music scenes and genres continue to fragment and blur, it is increasingly difficult to distinguish between a normative mainstream and a smaller number of resistant subcultures. Ultimately, today’s mainstream music reflects a complex set of negotiations between individuals, industry, production and consumption.

We invite contributions that address the topic of the mainstream from any perspective. The organising committee also gladly welcomes any general papers in the study of popular music.

Topics may include:
Redefining the mainstream
Mainstream music and everyday life
Global and local mainstreams
Mainstream music in educational contexts
Music, the mainstream and sporting cultures
Mainstreams, margins and minorities
Conflicts and controversies in the mainstream
Mainstream music across generations
Mainstream entertainment for children
Gender and sexuality in mainstream music
Mainstream music in the media

Abstract Submission
Abstracts should be submitted as an email attachment (Word document, 12pt Times New Roman font) to Gavin Carfoot (g.carfoot@griffith.edu.au). The deadline for receipt of abstract is 30 June 2007.
Please use your surname as the document title (for example, “Carfoot.doc”). The abstracts will be reviewed by an IASPM-ANZ committee and successful applicants advised by email. Please include the following details (in this order):
1. Name of author(s) (as you would like it to appear in the programme)
2. Institution or affiliation (where applicable)
3. Contact phone numbers
4. Email address
5. Title of paper
6. Abstract (200-300 words)
7. Consideration for 2007 IASPM-ANZ postgraduate prize? (Yes/No)

Registration
Registration details will be available on the conference website,
<http://www.iaspm.org.au/2008/conf/>. Please send registration forms to:
Jill Jones, Events Coordinator
Centre for Public Culture and Ideas
Nathan Campus
Griffith University
170 Kessels Road, Nathan
Brisbane, Queensland 4111
AUSTRALIA Ph: (07) 373 57338
Email: <j.jones@griffith.edu.au>

Membership
All presenters are required to be financial members of IASPM. Membership information can be found at the IASPM-ANZ webpage: www.iaspm.org.au, and will also be provided at the time of conference registration. For further membership information, please contact IASPM-ANZ treasurer Jennifer Cattermole, <jennifer.cattermole@gmail.com>.

Conference Publication
It is anticipated that a peer-reviewed publication will arise from the conference, under the editorship of Prof. Andy Bennett. Further details and submission guidelines will be announced closer to the conference date.

IASPM-ANZ Postgraduate Prize
Each year, IASPM-ANZ awards one postgraduate presenter with the IASPM-ANZ Postgraduate Prize for the best paper. An independent panel of established members determines the AUD$100 prize. To be considered for this prize, you must be currently enrolled as a postgraduate student. Please indicate your interest in being considered for this prize when submitting your abstract.

Conference Grants for Postgraduates
Postgraduate students who will be presenting a paper at the conference may be eligible for a $100 grant to assist with travel and expenses. Please contact IASPM-ANZ treasurer Jennifer Cattermole to discuss your eligibility or to ask for further information:
<jennifer.cattermole@gmail.com>.

For any general enquiries regarding the conference, please contact the
conference convenor:
Gavin Carfoot
Queensland Conservatorium Griffith University
Gold Coast campus
Griffith University Qld 4222
Phone: (07) 5552 8296
Fax: (07) 5552 9005
Email: <g.carfoot@griffith.edu.au>

Conference website: <http://www.iaspm.org.au/2008/conf/>
IASPM-ANZ: <http://www.iaspm.org.au>
Centre for Public Culture and Ideas:
<http://www.griffith.edu.au/centre/cpci/home.html>

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21. CfP: Youth Theatre Journal – Vol 23 2009 (due Oct 1)

The Scholarly Journal of the American Alliance for Theatre and Education

Youth Theatre Journal: The Scholarly Journal of the American Alliance for Theatre and Education is a juried publication (blind peer review), dedicated to advancing the study and practice of theatre and drama with, for, and by people of all ages. The journal publishes all forms of high quality scholarship informing the fields of theatre with, by and for young audiences, applied theatre, and drama/theatre education.

Contributors are encouraged to make submissions at any time to the editor at the address below. Final date for all submissions is 1 October 2008. All contributions should conform to the following guidelines:
- An electronic submission in MS Word format and One (1) hard copies of each manuscript must be presented. Hard copies need to match the electronic submission. Manuscripts should synthesize information cogently in 10-25 double-spaced, 12 pt font pages, excluding selective Works Cited, figures, tables, photographs, et cetera.
- Manuscripts must be prepared in accordance with the guidelines of the latest edition of the MLA Handbook or the APA Publication Manual. See the AATE Website for samples.
- For research involving “human subjects”, authors must verify that they have met the Ethical Standards for the Reporting and Publishing of Scientific Information (see APA Publication Manual, 5th edition, Appendix C) in the cover letter to the editor.
- A cover sheet/cover letter needs to include: the title of the manuscript; the author's name; affiliation; address; telephone; fax; email address; a brief biographical description of the author and a 100 word abstract of the paper.
- To insure anonymity, the author's name and affiliation must be struck from the text of the electronic submission and physical copy of the manuscript.
- Only manuscripts submitted with a SASE will be returned. Black and white photographs cannot be returned.

For questions regarding submissions contact: Stephani Etheridge Woodson swoodson@asu.edu

Please submit papers to:
Youth Theatre Journal Vol. 23
c/o Stephani Etheridge Woodson, Editor
School of Theatre & Film, Arizona State University
PO BOX 872002
Tempe AZ 85287-2002
480.965.5214
swoodson@asu.edu & YTJsubmissions@aate.com

Youth Theatre Journal is published annually by the American Alliance for Theatre and Education, 7475 Wisconsin Avenue, Suite 300A, Bethesda, MD 20814, Phone (301) 951-7977, Email info@aate.com

Information about subscription rates and advertising may be addressed by contacting the AATE office or from the website: http://www.aate.com

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22. CfP: ‘Re:live’ – Histories of Media Art, Science and Technology, November 26-29 2009, Melbourne, VCA, U of Melbourne, Australia (due Dec 19)

MEDIA ART HISTORY 09 Re:live
Third International Conference on the Histories of Media Art, Science and Technology

http://www.mediaarthistory.org
Sponsored by Leonardo and the Victorian College of the Arts (University of Melbourne)

Following the success of Media Art History 05 Re:fresh in Banff and Media Art History 07 Re:place in Berlin, Media Art History 09 Re:llve in Melbourne will host three days of keynotes, panels and poster sessions Media Art History 09 - Re:live, a refereed conference, is calling for papers, panels and posters on the histories of digital, electronic and technological media arts. With the theme of Re:live we are especially interested in expanding the range of topics to include sustainability, live arts and the technological arts of life, both organic and nonorganic.

How do the media arts change? Through innovation, accident, discovery, mutation or crisis? How did contemporary media arts come to look and sound like they do? What options and potentialities and eccentricities in the history of media have been lost or overlooked or suppressed? What hopes have been realised and which dashed? What is the history of speculation on alternate histories, and how have they altered the course of media art history?

Participants are asked to address at least one the following areas in their abstract:
- histories of the art-science-technology connection in particular works, careers, exhibitions and institutions, especially in national and regional perspective
- histories of biology, the life sciences and bioart in relation to media arts
- histories of the environment, environmental sciences, ideas of sustainability and ecology in the discourses and practices of media arts
- histories of liveness and performance in relation to media arts theory and practice, including network performance, multimedia performance and the relation of media to the histories of theatre
- histories of the life of machines, cyborgs, virtual communities and the arts of transmission
- histories of the liveness of real-time arts and art-science-technology collaborations in such areas as earth sciences, meteorology and astronomy
- histories of innovation, accident, discovery, and speculation on alternative futures in media arts

We particularly wish to encourage presentations from and about these histories in the Asia-Pacific region. Proposals are welcomed from artists, curators, arts organisers and researchers in media, art history, performance studies, literature, film, and science and technology studies.

Selected papers from the conference will be published in Leonardo (MIT Press). We are negotiating with academic presses for one or two anthologies from the conference.

Submissions: A dedicated website with updates and online paper submission system is available at http://www.mediaarthistory.org. Abstracts of proposals, panel presentations and posters should be submitted in either text, RTF, PDF or Word formats

Deadline for 200 word abstracts: 19th December 2008. Please submit proposals at
http://moodle.donau-uni.ac.at/relive/openconf.php

Sean Cubitt and Paul Thomas, conference co-chairs.

Prof Sean Cubitt
scubitt@unimelb.edu.au
Director, Media and Communications Program
Faculty of Arts
University of Melbourne

Editor-in-Chief Leonardo Book Series
http://leonardo.info

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23. Cf Proposals: Exeter Performance Studies, U of Exeter Press (no date)

Series editors: Graham Ley, Steve Nicholson, Peter Thomson
Exeter Performance Studies aims to publish the best new scholarship from a variety of sources, presenting established authors alongside innovative work from new scholars. The list explores critically the relationship between theatre and history, relating performance studies to broader political, social and cultural contexts. It also includes titles which document and offer access to previously unavailable material.
Books from the series have been widely and warmly reviewed, and recent titles have been short-listed for the annual prize of the Society for Theatre Research.
The editors are now inviting proposals to extend the series. Please address all enquiries to the University of Exeter Press uep@ex.ac.uk - or to one of the series editors.

British Theatre and the Red Peril: The Portrayal of Communism 1917–1945 Steve Nicholson (2000)
From Mimesis to Interculturalism: Readings of Theatrical Theory Before and After ‘Modernism’ Graham Ley (2000)
On Actors and Acting Peter Thomson (2000)
Grand-Guignol: The French Theatre of Horror Richard J. Hand and Michael Wilson (2002)
The Censorship of British Drama 1900-1968: Volume One 1900–1932 Steve Nicholson (2003)
The Censorship of British Drama 1900-1968: Volume Two 1933-1952 Steve Nicholson (2005)
Freedom’s Pioneer: John McGrath’s Work in Theatre, Film and Television edited by David Bradby and Susanna Capon (2005)
John McGrath—Plays for England selected and introduced by Nadine Holdsworth (2005)
Making Theatre in Northern Ireland: Through and Beyond the Troubles Tom Maguire (2006)
Theatre Workshop: Joan Littlewood and the Making of Modern British Theatre Robert Leach (2006)
“In Comes I”: Performance, Memory and Landscape Mike Pearson (2007)
London’s Grand Guignol and the Theatre of Horror Richard Hand & Michael Wilson (2007)
Theatres Of The Troubles: Theatre, Resistance and Liberation in Ireland Bill McDonnell (forthcoming)

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FORTHCOMING CONFERENCES AND SEMINARS.

24. ‘Weltbühne Wien: The Reception of Anglophone Plays on Viennese Stages of the 20th Centurty’ – May 11-13 2008, U of Vienna, Austria

With the help of various cultural studies approaches and methods, this interdisciplinary research project will explore processes of cultural transfer and the reception of anglophone plays on Vienna’s stages of the 20th century. The perspective of reception history will be extended and complemented by appropriate methods and approaches to investigate the relationships between the cultures involved: the project will focus on questions relating to cultures in contact and cultural transfer, to circulation and blockage of (foreign) cultural elements, to play selection and censorship, to the role of national stereotypes within the reception process, and to translation and adaptation. Further focal points will be the historical role of individual theatres and theatre directors, agents, cultural officers, and other important figures in Vienna’s theatre scene.

All in all, we will analyse the phenomenon of the transference of plays from their source culture into a foreign target culture and attempts at – or resistance against – their ‘naturalization’. The transfer of the originally anglophone play constitutes a form of cultural contact or intercultural exchange between Austria and Terranglia, the changing quality of which is to be explored in the context of individual historical periods. A number of hypotheses regarding the interculturality of drama and the role of foreign cultures in constructions of national identities will be put to a practical-analytical test. The project undertakes to examine, reconsider and, eventually, adapt and refine such hypotheses. In our context, this implies an investigation of the effects and repercussions of an increased contact with anglophone plays in terms of Austrian cultural as well as national identity in the twentieth century, a century of conflicts and crises. Ultimately, by investigating the transfer and reception of anglophone plays, the project will make an important contribution to the analysis of the processes of cultural transfer and to the history of Viennese theatre and culture.

Please click here for more information and conference programme:
http://www.univie.ac.at/weltbuehne_wien/conference.html

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25. ‘Transforming Museums: Bridging Theory and Practice’ – May 22-23 2008, Seattle WA, US

Thanks to the success of last year's conference, "Rethinking Museums," the University of Washington's Graduate Program in Museology is pleased to announce that registration is now open for ‘Transforming Museums: Bridging Theory and Practice’

Museums are institutions steeped in tradition but surrounded by constant change. "Transforming Museums" seeks ways that professionals can meet these changes deliberately and thoughtfully instead of being swept along their currents. "Transforming Museums" is the Museology Program's second annual interdisciplinary conference, and will feature presentations, panel discussions, and workshops from experienced leaders and new voices in the field. More information on sessions, presenters, and a detailed schedule is available on our website:

www.transformingmuseums.org.

Registration is open until May 16 and is free, thanks to the support of our sponsors. Conference proceedings, admission to half-day workshops, and reception tickets are also available for purchase when you register. Registration is limited for several sessions, so register now to secure your place at:

https://www.engr.washington.edu/epp/museum/registration1.php.

The conference will be held at Hotel Deca, located in the heart of the University District. Sessions and events will also be held at the Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture, Henry Art Gallery, Seattle Art Museum, Pacific Science Center and Experience Music Project | Science Fiction Museum and Hall of Fame.

Keynote Speakers:

Judy Rand, Director
Rand and Associates

Liz Ševčenko, Director
International Coalition of Historic Site Museums of Conscience

Discounted rates at Hotel Deca are available to conference attendees. More information on conference accommodations is available at:
http://depts.washington.edu/museum/2008.php#registration.

"Transforming Museums" is generously supported by the University of Washington's Museology Graduate Program, the Simpson Center for the Humanities, Seattle Art Museum, Experience Music Project | Science Fiction Museum and Hall of Fame, Henry Art Gallery, and the Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture at the University of Washington.

We look forward to seeing you there!

Transforming Museums Committee
museum@u.washington.edu

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26. ‘Languages at Play: Theatre Translation as Cultural Transfer’ – May 31 2008, U of Warwick

School of Theatre and Performance Studies & Italian Department

WHEN: 31st May 2008
WHERE: Theatre Studies Studio and Writers Room, Millburn House (University of Warwick)

PROGRAMME

09.00 – 9.30 (Milburn House: Writer’s room & Studio) Registration and Coffee

9.30 -11.30 TRANSLATING TRANSLATIONS
Workshop with playwright / translator Paul Sirrett (Soho Theatre, London)

How does a play make the journey from one language to another? How does a literal translation become a performance text? How do we translate a translation? This practical workshop examines the process of working from a literal translation towards a script for performance using Spanish Golden Age classics and contemporary Polish plays. Participants do not need to be able to speak or read texts in the original language as they will be working in English.
(If you plan to take part in the workshop, please register early since the number of participants is limited).

11.30 – 11.45 Coffee

SESSION 1: TRANSLATION AND CULTURAL TRANSFER
11.45 – 1.15 Chair: Ann Hallamore Caesar (University of Warwick)

Manuela Perteghella (London Metropolitan University)
Alessandra De Martino-Cappuccio (University of Warwick)
Joe Farell (University of Strathclyde)

1.15 – 2.15 Lunch

SESSION 2: WRITING IN TONGUES
2.15 – 3.45 Chair: Jim Davis (University of Warwick)

David Edgar (playwright)
Goran Stefanovski (playwright)
Timberlake Wertenbaker (playwright)

3.45 – 4.00 Tea

ROUNDTABLE: NEGOTIATING TRANSLATION: FROM TEXT TO CONTEXT
4.00 – 5.00 Chair: Janelle Reinelt

Participants: Maureen Freely (University of Warwick), David Edgar, Hazem Azmy (University of Warwick), Ann Hallamore-Caesar,Cristina Marinetti (University of Warwick), Paul Sirrett, Goran Stefanovski

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27. ‘Of Sacred Crossroads’ – 2008 ACS Crossroads Conference, July 3-7, U of the West Indies, Kingston, Jamaica

The Caribbean could well be regarded as one of the first crossroads of the modern era, where Africa and Asia met Europe on Amerindian soil. The conditions were a forced and bitter crucible. The results of that encounter contributed not only to the making of the modern western world but also to the dynamism that is central to all the cultures of the Western Hemisphere.

Of Sacred Crossroads

Being a site of conquest, dislocation, crossings, enslavement and rebellion, but also of memory and survival, hope of return, culture-building, in-between-ness, and immense creativity and heritage, the Caribbean is a relevant site for hosting the 7th International Crossroads in Cultural Studies Conference, under the theme Of Sacred Crossroads.
Contemporary emphasis on materialism and consumerism as measures of our humanity, arising from the unbridled excesses to which science and technology have been sometimes put, is of growing concern, putting under duress the intangibles embodied in the values by which we live as human beings. Out of these concerns has sprung deepening dialogue at the interface between science and spirituality.
UNESCO's celebration of the intangible heritage of humankind is a timely reminder that civilizations rise not only on great edifices, monuments and artefacts that defy time, but also on those moments of 'livity', or human relationships, that last only as long as they are lived, without which human life would have little meaning.

Of Sacred Crossroads captures many of these concerns in a manner that allows for the broadest of interpretation and accommodation across disciplines and forms—religion, art, dance, song, orature, healing, re-creation, performance, ritual, belief systems, ethics, globalization, communication, among others.

Spotlight themes include:
- Rituals of arrival and contact
- Crossings: The art of the Caribbean crossroads
- Spirituality and Identity
- Language rituals
- Globalization and the spirit
- Indigenous spiritualities
- Rituals of conflict, rites of rebellion
- Virtual realities, virtual spiritualities
- (Spiritual) Tourism
- Rituals, substances and sacred geographies
- The spirit of music
- Cultures of reconciliation
- Storytelling
- Crossroad Deities and divination
- Geographies of the body and spirit

General areas of interest include:

- Body - Identity and Difference
- Media
- Gender and sexuality
- Popular culture
- Cultural industries
- Performance and gender
- Youth culture
- Religion and culture
- Nation states
- Power and knowledge
- New information technology
- Globalization and diaspora
- Nationalism and locality
- Consumerism and fetishism
- Culture and economy
- Fundamentalisms
- Cultural Studies pedagogy
- Policing the crisis
- Culture and ethics
- Critical methodologies
- Politics of opposition
- Cultures of everyday life
- Social and cultural theory
- The city
- Cultural policy
- Centre and periphery
- Space and culture
- Imagined communities

See the website www.crossroads2008.org for more details.

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28. ‘Performativities of Emptiness’ - AHRC Landscape and Environment Network Conference, June 6-7 2008, U of Bristol, UK

You are warmly invited to the final event in this AHRC Landscape and Environment Network. This conference brings together Network partners and event participants to share work and disseminate findings. Our series of location-based workshops at Bristol Temple Meads Railway Station, Sennybridge Training Centre at Mynydd Epynt (Brecon Beacons) and the Avonmouth-Severn Beach Littoral strip aimed to foster cross-disciplinary approaches to understanding 'landscapes' as networks of practised places. In particular, we focused on places that are seen to be abandoned, degraded, disappeared, transitory, unmarked. Yet they are, of course materially rich, living communities in which the political ethics of seeing and being seen to be empty are at the forefront of our concerns. This focus engaged with the ways in which landscape and environment are often valued or devalued, remembered and forgotten, enabling them to contest and complicate assumptions regarding 'empty space' as well as trace the cultural configurations that create 'emptiness'. 'Emptiness' is thus considered to present a performative focusing on the active and ongoing constitution of landscapes and environments.

TO REGISTER: please email D.J.Blackmore-Squires@bristol.ac.uk.
Registration is free and includes lunches, teas and coffees.

FRIDAY
10.30-10.45 Welcome
10.45-11.15 Professor Stephen Daniels: Plenary
11.15-12.45 Events: Iain Biggs, Angela Piccini, Heike Roms
12.45-1.45 Lunch
1.45-3 Presentation 1: works and discussion with invited workshop
participants
3-3.30 Tea/Coffee
3.30-5 Emptiness and Presence: J D Dewsbury, James Dixon, Mike Pearson
5-6 Wine reception
6-7 Good Cop Bad Cop: Phantom Ride

SATURDAY
9.30-10 Hayden Lorimer: Plenary
10-11.30 Emptying and Absence: Jo Carruthers, Roger Owen, John Wylie
11.30-12 Tea/Coffee
12-1.30 Spacings: Iain Biggs, Owain Jones, Karen Till
1.30-2.15 Lunch
2.15-3.30 Presentation 2: works and discussion with invited workshop
participants
3.30-4 Tea/Coffee
4-5.30 Methods: Penny Bickle, Angela Piccini
5.30-6.30 Closing discussion with Professor Ralph Pite

CONTRIBUTORS

Chairs: Sally Bushell (AHRC L & E Award holder, University of Lancaster),
Adeline Johns-Putra (AHRC L & E Award holder, University of Exeter) Dan
Shipsides (AHRC L & E Award holder, University of Ulster), Ika Willis
(University of Bristol)

Penny Bickle, University of Cardiff
Prof Iain Biggs, University of West of England
Jo Carruthers, University of Bristol
Prof Stephen Daniels, University of Nottingham (Head of AHRC Landscape and
Environment scheme)
J D Dewsbury, University of Bristol
Jim Dixon, University of Bristol/University of West of England
Anna Farthing
Moira Gavin
Good Cop Bad Cop
Owain Jones, University of Gloucester
Hayden Lorimer, University of Glasgow
Jem Noble
Roger Owen, University of Aberystwyth
Prof Mike Pearson, University of Aberystwyth
Angela Piccini, University of Bristol
Prof Ralph Pite, University of Bristol
Heike Roms, University of Aberystwyth
Carol Stevens, University of West of England
Karen Till, University of Minnesota
John Wylie, University of Exeter

FURTHER INFORMATION AT

<http://www.landscape.ac.uk/networks_and_workshops/living_in_a_material_wor
ld_project_details.htm>

<http://humanitieslab.stanford.edu/materialworld/11>

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29. ‘Widening the Circumference’ – July 2-3 2008, York St John U, UK

Widening the Circumference: investigating the potential of drama, theatre and film in the education of health professionals.

This symposium will bring together health professionals, educators, students and drama/theatre practitioners. It will provide an opportunity through theatre, film and drama to explore the human experience in social and health care environments.

The symposium will feature:
Live performances
workshops
seminars
film screenings and discussions

For more details go to: http://www2.yorksj.ac.uk/default.asp?Page_ID=5239

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30. Electronic Visualisation and the Arts, July 22-24 2008, London, UK

EVA London 2008
Catch the Early Bird rates! The outstanding EVA programme is online now:
http://www.eva-conferences.com/eva_london/

When? 22-24 July 2008
Where? British Computer Society, London WD2E 7HA

REGISTRATION OPEN

EVA London 2008 will debate the issues, discuss trends and demonstrate the digitial possibilities in:
• Performing arts
• Visual arts
• New technologies
• Interactive media
• Museums, archives and galleries

If you are interested in the new technologies in the cultural sector – if you are an artist, policy maker, manager, researcher, practitioner, audience evaluator or educator – this conference is for you.

Registration and outline programme
http://www.eva-conferences.com/eva_london/

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Seminars

31. ISET European Interdisciplinary Seminar Series, May 6 2008, London Metropolitan U, UK
Spring 2008: Memory of War

The ISET seminar series addresses key issues in the making and remaking of Europe, whether economic, political, social or cultural. In the context of globalization, these extend beyond Europe's borders, and interrogate definitions of European identity.

In the spring of 2008, the focus is on the cultural strand of ISET's work and the theme is Memory of War. These seminars bring together approaches influenced by sociology, anthropology, cultural studies and cultural history, in an exploration of the importance and fragility of memory in the context of traumatic experience.

The series will discuss memory of World War Two, from different perspectives and the impact of conflicts with deep historical roots in Northern Ireland and Lebanon.

Seminars will take place between 6.00 - 7.30 p.m in The Old Staff Café
London Metropolitan University, Tower Building, 166-220 Holloway Road

ALL WELCOME - refreshments provided

http://www.londonmet.ac.uk/iset

15 April Aida Kanafani-Zahar (CNRS, Paris)
The memory of the unimaginable: massacres and forced population transfers in Lebanon (1983)

22 April Inge Weber-Newth (ISET)
Perpetrators or Victims? Germans' Shifting Memories of War

29 April Nirmal Puwar (Goldsmiths College, University of London)
In the Name of the Father: Stone, War and Memory in Coventry (WW2)

6 May Graham Dawson (Brighton University)
Making peace with the past? Memory, trauma and the Irish Troubles

32. ‘Spectatorship’ - Intermedia Research Group, May 8-June 12 2008, Centre for Research in the Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities, Cambridge, UK

The Intermedia Research Group's term on the topic of Engaged Spectatorship is now available below and online. These four sessions will focus on ways of theorizing and discussing aesthetic engagements across artistic media, with particular focus on film, performance, and the visual arts.

The Intermedia Research Group is part of Cambridge's Centre for Research in the Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities. Readings will be made available at CRASSH the week before each event. Everyone is welcome.

INTERMEDIA RESERCH GROUP: ENGAGED SPECTATORSHIP
Venue: CRASSH, 17 Mill Lane, Cambridge

8 May - 1:30
Dr. Jennifer Doyle (University of California at Riverside)
Difficulty: On Limits Critical and Otherwise

22 May - 1:30
Prof. Christopher Townsend (Royal Holloway, University of London)
Aspects of Intermediality and Spectatorship in the Modernist Event

29 May - 5pm (note change in time)
Dr. Rebecca Schneider (Brown University)
Still Living: Theatricality, Photography, and Reenactment

12 June - 1:30
Dr. Suzannah Biernoff (Birkbeck College, University of London)
Working with Medical Archives: Disgust, Shame and the Ethics of Spectatorship

http://www.crassh.cam.ac.uk/page/29/intermedia-research.htm

For more information on the Engaged Spectatorship term, please contact Kate Elswit (kme27@cam.ac.uk) and Axel Bangert (ab534@cam.ac.uk).

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33. ‘Rethinking Museums, Memorials and Monuments’ – May 10 2008, Cultural Memory Seminar Series, U of London

The third in the Cultural Memory Seminar Series for the year 2007-08:

Saturday 10th May, 2008, 11 a.m. - 4 p.m.
Institute of Germanic and Romance Studies, Room 274, Stewart House
(adjacent to Senate House, University of London)

The speakers:
Dr Mary Stevens (University College London), "Towards the hybrid museum? The
aesthetics and politics of the memory of immigration in the Cité nationale
de l'histoire de l'immigration".

Dr Beverley Butler (University College London), title tbc

Professor Bill Niven, (Nottingham Trent University) "On the dangers of the
abstract in Holocaust memorials".

Dr Richard Benjamin (Head of the International Slavery Museum, Liverpool),
"The International Slavery Museum: issues and concerns".

Lunch (own arrangements) is provisionally scheduled for 1 p.m.
All are welcome and there is no fee.

For details on finding the Institute, please see the IGRS website: http://igrs.sas.ac.uk/

The Cultural Memory Seminar Series is co-hosted by the Institute of Germanic and Romance Studies (University of London) and the Raphael Samuel Centre (University of East London). It is organised by Rick Crownshaw (Goldsmiths, University of London), Carrie Hamilton (Roehampton University) and Susannah Radstone (University of East London).

Please contact Rick (r.crownshaw@gold.ac.uk), Carrie (C.Hamilton@RUS.ROEHAMPTON.AC.UK) or Susannah (s.radstone@uel.ac.uk) for further information.

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34. Thursday Club Season – May 8-June 5 2008, Goldsmiths, UK

** NEW THURSDAY CLUB SEASON ** NEW THURSDAY CLUB SEASON ** NEW
Supported by the Goldsmiths GRADUATE SCHOOL and the Goldsmiths DIGITAL STUDIOS

6pm until 8pm, Seminar Rooms at Ben Pimlott Building (Ground Floor, right), Goldsmiths, University of London, New Cross, SE14 6NW

FREE, ALL ARE WELCOME. No booking required.

*8 MAY with CAMILLE BAKER & MARILENE OLIVER
MINDTouch & Making DICOM Dance – The Digitised Body as a site for performing subjectivity*

MINDTouch explores ideas of non-verbal transference, telepathic collaboration, and the participant as performer, using biofeedback and mobile phone technology under meta-goals of studying "liveness" within mobile networked environments. MINDTouch involves creating a mobile networked performance that utilizes a database of streamed and/or archived video-clips created by video-enabled mobile phones, to then be retrieved, streamed and remixed during (a) live visuals performance(s). The participants invited to contribute to the video blogs are asked to explore their own consciousness, non-verbal emotional /affective senses and dream states, embodiment and communication. www.smartlab.uk.com/2projects/mindtouch.htm

CAMILLE BAKER is a Ph.D. Candidate at SMARTlan, University of East London, conducting research on Networked Performance Media, funded by BBC R+D. www.swampgirl67.net

Making DICOM Dance: Marilene Oliver’s practice-based research looks at medical and laser imaging technologies that scan bodies and break them down to bytes. Oliver examines from an artist’s perspective, the processes needed to convert flesh to pixel (digital photography), flesh to voxel (MRI, CT and PET) and flesh to xyz co-ordinates (3D laser scanning). Oliver will present a selection of artworks made using MRI data (where the subject of the scans is bespoke) and CT data (where the subject of the scans are either infamous or anonymous). The presentation will be both technical and theoretical, concentrating on the performative puppeteering activity that emerges when working with MRI and CT data.

MARILENE OLIVER is currently a research student in the Fine Art Print department at the Royal College of Art. Oliver has exhibited widely in the UK and Europe including the Victoria and Albert Museum, Royal Academy, Royal Institution, Science Museum (UK). Oliver was awarded the Royal Academy print prize in 2006 and the Printmaking Today prize in 2001.

*15 MAY with COLM LALLY & VERINA GFADER
Condensation revisited: strategic walking / access to knowledge /economics of things / conversation pieces *

In June 2007 Colm and Verina were invited to take part in the residency programme: Reference Check, a co-production lab taking place at the Banff New Media Institute in Banff, Alberta, Canada. During the residency they expanded the notion of “interface” associated with various forms of online communication and exchange, to other, perhaps more radical, forms of spaces between different entities. At the core Colm & Verina's actions emerges the search for where a site of potential resides beside of technologies’ restrictive mode of ex/inter-change and so-called collaborative or networked practices. Colm & Verina will present the “document” of the process that their project Condensation took during the residency at Banff. This includes questions of: the necessity of temporary frameworks; the character of dialogical communication processes; the failure as a site of potential. In an informal setting the “document” will take the format of a line, or “walking” – of virtually making a tour through various landscapes...

COLM LALLY is founder and director of E:vent. Since 2003 Colm has taken a hands-on role developing the E:vent programme, focusing on media art; video; performance; and electronic music. Colm was a co-organiser of Node.London 06 and is co-director of Arts in Action artists community.

VERINA GFADER completed a practice-based Ph.D. in Fine Arts at Central Saint Martins College, London in 2006, and recently joined CRUMB (web resource for new media art curators) as post-doc research assistant.

*29 MAY with RICHARD COLSON
Linking the Senses *

Richard Colson considers the role of gesture as part of any process of making art and reflects on its use in his painting and in his work using digital technologies. The talk will try to unravel aspects of experience that have a direct bearing on the interdependence of vision, auditory phenomena, gesture and spatial changes in both the creation of art and its reception by the viewer. Richard will use visual art works and examples of creative writing and will try to show how an awareness of spatial position can have a critical influence on the nature of what is perceived.

RICHARD COLSON is the author of The Fundamentals of Digital Art (AVA Publishing Uk Ltd) and co-curated Sense Detectives at Watermans Arts Centre. He is a Director of the annual Takeaway Festival of DIY Media at the Dana Centre, Science Museum. His paintings are in collections at the House of Lords, the House of Commons, Royal Dutch Shell and Pearson PLC. www.kwomodo.com

*5 JUNE with ALEX MCLEAN & DAVE GRIFFITHS
:Live Coding*

Live coders program in conversation with their machine, dynamically adding instructions and functions to running programs. Here there is no distinction between creating and running a piece of software – its execution is controlled through edits to its source code. Live coding has recently become popular in performance, where software is written before an audience in order to generate music and video for them to enjoy. McLean and Griffiths have played around Europe together with Adrian Ward as the live coding band "slub". They will talk about the history and practice of live coding, and give some demos of their own live coding environments.

ALEX MCLEAN has been triggering distorted kick drum samples with Perl scripts for far too long. He is a PhD student at Goldsmiths Digital Studios.

DAVE GRIFFITHS writes programs to make noises, pictures and animations. He makes film effectis software and computer games.

Dave & Alex are both members of the Openlan free software artists collective and the TOPLAP organisation for live algorithm promotion. slub.org ; toplap.org ; pawfal.org/openlab ; pawfal.org/dave ; yaxu.org

THE THURSDAY CLUB is an open forum discussion group for anyone interested in the theories and practices of cross-disciplinarity, interactivity, technologies and philosophies of the state-of-the-art in today’s (and tomorrow’s) cultural landscape(s).

For more information check http://www.goldsmiths.ac.uk/gds/events.php or email Maria X at drp01mc@gold.ac.uk

To find Goldsmiths check http://www.goldsmiths.ac.uk/find-us/

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ONLINE

35. newworknetwork online discussionNWN are excited to announce the launch of ‘Forum Provocateurs’- an online discussion and live event responding to the theme of socially engaged arts practice.

Writer and Dean of Brown Mountain College of the Performing Arts Sally O’Reilly, artist Charlie Fox and writer and curator Rachel Lois Clapham have created a number of forum threads: log in to the NWN website and take a look to join the debate <http://www.newworknetwork.org.uk/modules/newbb/viewforum.php?forum=25>

Starting off this week and continuing during Chelsea Theatre’s SACRED Season < http://www.chelseatheatre.org.uk/sacred08.htm>, the Forum Provocateurs debate is an opportunity to get involved in discussions with NWN members online and follow up these exchanges at the live Forum Provocateurs round table discussion event taking place at Chelsea Theatre (World's End Place, King's Road, London SW10 0DR) on 10 May at 5 pm. Tickets are £4 (£3 concessions) and FREE to NWN members. Chelsea Box office: 020 7352 1967

NWN members involved in the online forum discussions will be able to apply for a complimentary ticket to some of the performances in SACRED’s programme. Contact Hannah Crosson for details: info@newworknetwork.org.uk. Additionally, Chelsea Theatre is offering NWN members concessionary rates on all tickets to the season. Please quote “NWN offer” when booking via phone or select ‘Concession’ if booking online.

For info on how to join NWN please go to: www.newwworknetwork.org.uk or call 0207 539 9373

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36. New Online Publication

Date for submissions to first issue: June 30, 2008;
Source: Jamie McMurry

greetings all

after some years of discussion with many of you, i have decided to attempt the launch of a magazine devoted to international performance art activities. the publication will be infrequent initially, and I hope will eventually lead to a regular and dependable version. it will be comprised entirely of contributions from people like you and dependent on those contributions in order to exist.

here are the basic parameters;
-there is a great online publishing resource based here in the US called lulu.com
they are an online publishing house that allows you to have books and magazines printed in any quantity and charge anywhere between $4 and $20 per copy depending on length and design. they also have a feature that allows anyone to download an electronic version of any publication for free or cheap.
-i will collect related writings, images, information from various sources and compile this material into a multi-page document/magazine. items will only be edited to accommodate
space and layout as needed.
-people will then be able to purchase a copy of the magazine directly from the publishers website, or be able to download an electronic version for free from that same location.

the idea is that one person takes on the responsibility for collecting and compiling information about activities in the field in a mostly open fo