{"title":"Playing History","authors":"Julie Rongved Amundsen","doi":"10.7146/nts.v31i1.113004","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.7146/nts.v31i1.113004","url":null,"abstract":"Spelet om Heilag Olav, also called Stiklestadspelet, is Norway’s longest running historical spel. Spels are Norwegian annual outdoor performances about a historical event from the local place where the spel is performed. Spelet om Heilag Olav is about the martyr death of King Olav Harladsson at Stiklestad in 1030, which is said to have brought Christianity to Norway. The spel is subject to conservative aesthetics where both the history of medieval Norway and the spel’s own inherent history guarantees that there will not be big changes in the performance from year to year. This conservative aesthetics makes room for a certain form of nostalgia that can be linked to play. The spel makes use of more serious sides of play. In the theories of Victor Turner, play is connected to the liminoid that differs from the liminal because the liminoid is connected to choice while the liminal is duty. The spel is liminoid but it can be argued that the liminoid has a mimetic relationship to the liminal and through play the spel can make use of several liminal qualities without becoming an actually transforming event. One of the main aesthetic ideas of the spel is authenticity. That this today feels old fashioned is legitimized through the necessity of authenticity and authenticity’s connection to play. Through the use of Žižek’s theories of ideology and his term of failure, the article argues that the failure of creating totalities is inherent to theatre, and that this failure is play. Because the totalities are not clear, the event plays with desire showing its audience, through a form of rituality, how what is happening is an important event for the nation as a whole. Spelet om Heilag Olav becomes an effective presenter of Norwegian ideology because it manages Norwegian history in a way that focuses more on the collective experience of the event than on its content.","PeriodicalId":53807,"journal":{"name":"Nordic Theatre Studies","volume":"19 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2019-03-13","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"76465063","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"艺术学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Bourdieusian Concepts and the Field of Theatre Criticism","authors":"Martynas Petrikas","doi":"10.7146/NTS.V31I1.112999","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.7146/NTS.V31I1.112999","url":null,"abstract":"Pierre Bourdieu’s concepts of field sociology began their life in humanities, particularly in literature and art studies after publication of his seminal Les règles de l’art: genèse et structure du champ littéraire in 1992. Regretfully, Bourdieu has not left a study dedicated to theatre, possibly due to the long-standing French tradition of considering theatre as another literary genre. Nevertheless, Bourdieusian sociology is abundant with terms, concepts, and ideas that are extremely handy in analyzing and understanding how theatre was produced in the past and is produced in the present. The appropriation of Bourdieu’s ideas for theatre studies is a tempting effort, especially considering how closely theatre is intertwined with the phenomena of habitus, distinction, and all the forms of capital described by Bourdieu himself. The aim of my article is to discuss the applicability of selected Bourdieusian notions and concepts for research of a very specific aspect of theatre studies. I argue that the concepts of field (champs), nomos, doxa, illusio as well as of symbolic violence are very useful in understanding the nature, functions, and effects of theatre criticism. Dwelling on my own theoretical research, I propose to understand theatre criticism as another field of social practice that is definedby the conflict between the opposing interests of t","PeriodicalId":53807,"journal":{"name":"Nordic Theatre Studies","volume":"54 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2019-03-13","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"79614557","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"艺术学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Towards a Spectatorial Approach to Drama Analysis","authors":"Ulla Kallenbach, A. Kuhlmann","doi":"10.7146/NTS.V30I2.112950","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.7146/NTS.V30I2.112950","url":null,"abstract":"In recent years, the concept of dramaturgy has been expanded to include a wide range of new fields that rarely concern the analysis of the drama text itself, but rather the facilitation of creative processes. This article investigates dramaturgy as an analytical practice. The article provides an analytical, historical investigation of methodological approaches to drama analysis. The aim is to examine how drama analysis came to be regarded as a literary discipline that rarely considers aspects of performance and the material, scenic context for which the play was written. The study of drama thus became regarded as being distinct from theatre and performance studies. This approach, which has its roots in nineteenth century dramaturgy, effectively eliminated the spectator from its perspective in favour of a character and plot centred dramaturgy. It is the authors’ assertion that the drama text and theatrical performance should, nevertheless, be regarded as intrinsically interconnected and that the spectator must be “re-inserted” in the analysis of the written drama. The authors explore how we might re-think the field of dramaturgy as drama analysis by emphasizing the corporeal, spatial, performative, and cognitive aspects of the drama text together with an emphasis on the historical and scenic context.","PeriodicalId":53807,"journal":{"name":"Nordic Theatre Studies","volume":"13 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2019-03-13","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"73665960","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"艺术学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"‘Suddenly a Stranger Appears’","authors":"F. Rokem","doi":"10.7146/NTS.V31I1.112998","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.7146/NTS.V31I1.112998","url":null,"abstract":"My contribution to the the NTS issue on Theatre and Continental Philosophy discusses a particular aspect of the complex intellectual and creative dialogue between the work and thinking of Walter Benjamin and Bertolt Brecht, beginning in 1929, the year they became close friends. Benjamin is no doubt the first critic of Brecht’s epic theatre, even planning to write a book about his artistic contributions. By examining the notion of the “Interruption” (Die Unterbrechung) and the sudden appearance of a stranger in three of Benjamin’s texts about Brecht’s epic theatre, I want to draw attention to Benjamin’s philosophical understanding of this ‘critical’ figure’ (the interrupting stranger), as one of the central aspects of the epic theatre. The essay is a prolegomenon for a more comprehensive study of this topic.","PeriodicalId":53807,"journal":{"name":"Nordic Theatre Studies","volume":"5 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2019-03-13","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"90600159","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"艺术学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"What Happened to Theatre Studies?","authors":"Niels Lehmann","doi":"10.7146/NTS.V30I2.112948","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.7146/NTS.V30I2.112948","url":null,"abstract":"In this article, the recent development of theatre studies is outlined in order to suggest a way forward under the heading of “theatre studies 3.0.” A double thesis is defended. Firstly, it is argued that the development of theatre studies is marked by a simultaneous tendency towards pragmatization, theorization, and expansion. Secondly, it is shown that these three strands of development may be seen as reactions to a more fundamental threefold change of the social semantics: a decline of the tradition of edification, an insistence of convergence of the theoretically and the practically oriented programmesof education, and finally a loss of self-evident borders for disciplines. Having suggested what happened to theatre studies and why it happened, the article suggests that we follow a path called “theatre studies 3.0.” based on “an asymmetrical double strategy”.","PeriodicalId":53807,"journal":{"name":"Nordic Theatre Studies","volume":"29 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2019-03-13","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"80371754","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"艺术学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Magnitudes of Performativity","authors":"Teemu Paavolainen","doi":"10.7146/NTS.V30I2.112953","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.7146/NTS.V30I2.112953","url":null,"abstract":"The article presents the Trump presidency and the human-driven geological epoch of the Anthropocene as two arguable extremes among current notions of ‘performativity’: (1) a traditionally vertical model based on individual action and antagonism – where ‘facts’ matter less than ‘making things great’; and (2) the more extended, horizontal human performance of things like global warming (“All the world’s a stage”). Drawing freely on George Lakoff and Timothy Morton, it is argued that these models differ fundamentally in ‘magnitude’: where the one is direct, singular, vertical, and fast, the other is systemic, plural, horizontal, and slow beyond human perception. With Judith Butler and Naomi Klein, it is also argued that to actually confront the twin crises at issue, we need to acknowledge the kind of ‘plural performativity’ – of repetition, norms, and dissimulation – that brought them into being in the first place.","PeriodicalId":53807,"journal":{"name":"Nordic Theatre Studies","volume":"41 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2019-03-13","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"90274298","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"艺术学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"In-between Figure Working in a Precarious Field","authors":"Solveig Gade","doi":"10.7146/NTS.V30I2.112952","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.7146/NTS.V30I2.112952","url":null,"abstract":"This essay is preoccupied with a notion that is often embraced in theatre and performance theory: that of the dramaturge as a flexible, in-between figure. Taking into consideration, however, the precarious working and living conditions that freelance dramaturgs are typically subjected to as well as the structural parallels between the flexible dramaturg and the ideal of the agile post-Fordist employee, the article sets out to critically investigate the concept of inbetween-ness. Theoretically, the essay draws on theory formations from theatre and performance theory on new dramaturgies as well as theories from political theory and performance theory concerning the precarious working conditions experienced by a majority of cultural workers today. Empirically, the essay builds on two surveys conducted amongst dramaturgs working in the field of Danish theatre and dance with a view to shedding light on their working conditions, particularly with regards to wages and credit policy. The data obtained in the two surveys is analysed and discussed against the background of the two theoretical strands laid out in the first part of the article. In conclusion, the article ventures the claim that if we wish to create sustainable working conditions for dramaturgs, especially those working on a freelance basis, we need to critically address not only their actual working conditions, but also the notions and concepts through which dramaturgs tend to self-identify.","PeriodicalId":53807,"journal":{"name":"Nordic Theatre Studies","volume":"8 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2019-03-13","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"89936800","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"艺术学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Three Phases of the Theatrical Public Sphere in Estonian Theatre","authors":"E. Linder","doi":"10.7146/NTS.V31I1.113002","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.7146/NTS.V31I1.113002","url":null,"abstract":"The concept of the public sphere by Jürgen Habermas has inspired humanities and theatre studies. Estonia, as a small post-totalitarian nation state, proves the concept especially relevant as its recent history reveals three different phases of the theatrical public sphere. 1) Theatre as a secret forum. In Soviet times, theatre served as a political and ideological tool, providing a place for keeping the national memory and consolidating society. 2) The active and technical use of the public sphere by newly awakened political theatre NO99 since 2005. 3) The agonistic theatrical public sphere. During the past decade, a whole wave of projects have discussed national identity with concurrent antagonisms: globalization vs nationalism, civic vs ethnic nationalism, the Estonian vs Russianspeaking community. Theatre has commented on two concepts of national identity, e-Estonia and Organic Estonia, innovative digitalization and cultural traditions. The discursive public sphere has led to increased civic awareness and structural changes in the developing democracy, supported integration, and anti-xenophobia in Estonia. At the same time, two main characteristics of the theatrical public sphere have been highlighted: spatiality and political relevance","PeriodicalId":53807,"journal":{"name":"Nordic Theatre Studies","volume":"27 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2019-03-13","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"79198857","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"艺术学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}