Performing Politics/Politicising Performance

Summer School of Political Dissent - Institute of Advanced Study - University of Warwick

How does the dialectics of performing politics and politicising performance enable us to read between the lines of various competing and contesting political, social and cultural texts? How do we as interdisciplinary scholars are to navigate through the landscape of the global political public sphere in a critical and relevant manner, to, in Brechtian sense of estrangement, foreground and see better that what has been hidden from the view?

This one week summer school for PhD students and postdocs will focus on ways in which interdisciplinary approaches from diverse subject areas, such as Theatre and Performance Studies, Politics, Law can draw on theoretical models and creative practices to better understand performance paradigms behind various aspects of the political. Problematising urgent global issues—such as human rights, migration, refugee crises, citizenship, political protests and other forms of political dissent— the school will explore ways in which they have been framed, represented and performed through political rhetoric, media renderings, artistic and cultural forms, and embodied practices of politics, art, and everyday life.

Through talks, workshops, and demonstrations the participants will be involved in a variety of disciplinary approaches and ways in which they could be combined—from traditional scholarly research methods to strategies of practice-as-research. The summer school will offer a varied and inspiring program of talks, seminars, screenings and practical workshops. Each day will focus on one theme that will be approached through various angles, different forms, and cultural perspectives.

The themes to be covered in the Summer School include:

• Performances of Protest: Dramaturgies, Manifestations, and Appropriations
• Human Rights and Practices
• Performing Citizenship
• Migrations, refugee crises and democracy
• Gender, Race and Performance

Keynote lecture: "Riotous Assemblies: reading the riot as theatrical act" - Sophie Nield (Royal Holloway)