Module Identifier PF20210  
Module Title PERFORMANCE IN CONTEXT  
Academic Year 2004/2005  
Co-ordinator Professor Mike Pearson  
Semester Semester 1  
Other staff Ms Jill Greenhalgh, Dr Roger Owen  
Course delivery Lecture   20 Hours 10 x 2 hour lecture/seminar presentations  
Assessment
Assessment TypeAssessment Length/DetailsProportion
Semester Assessment Essay: 2,500 word written essay Write an in-depth commentary on the relationship between and one of the principal examples of performance and one of the areas of negotiation discussed during the module 50%
Semester Assessment Performed essay of 15 minutes duration Reconsider and rearticulate the material presented in the above essay in a different spatial or temporal context. This may be done live, on video or through any other medium (The performed essay will be marked jointly by two members of staff) This module will also be subject to non-contributory self and peer assessment for the students to monitor their own progress. 50%

Learning outcomes

On successful completion of this module students should be able to:
Learning outcomes :

Typically, upon completion of the module, the student will be able:
- to demonstrate an intelligent awareness of the repercussions of social and cultural context upon the form and function of performance
- to formulate and employ personal research strategies in the examination of the relationship between a specific context and performance practice
- to analyse reflexively - and to rework performatively - personal intellectual argument
to realise academic argument through performative procedures, requiring communication and oral presentation skills; and to employ personal performative practices in academic presentation


Aims

The aim of this module is:

To provide a non-chronological and non-canonical approach to the identification description of performance behaviours, practices and genres, and to performance-like activities.
To identify a number of contexts in which different types of performance may be negotiated: and the social, cultural and environmental implications of those contexts on the nature, form, function and placement of performance.
To examine these contexts in a comparative and interdisciplinary manner, drawing from the fields of history, anthropology, human geography, sociology, politics, rhetoric and aesthetics.

Content

Lecture Schedule:
1. Field: the 'empty' space and the performance of contestation (e.g. sport, warfare, war re-enactment, caravanserai, landscape art)
2. Village: social interaction and the performance of communality (e.g. British rural rituals and proto-theatrical events, kathakali, Balinese dance)
3. City: complexity and the performance of individual identity (e.g. Greek theatre, popular entertainments of early modern Europe, commedia dell arte, the choreography of gesture)
4. Nation: rhetoric and the performance of power (e.g. Soviet and Fascist rallies, court society and ballet)
5. Revolution: stimulation and the performance of opposition (e.g. street theatre and protest, Polish theatre)
6. Emigration: interculturalism and the performance of hybridity (e.g Minority theatre and immigrant theatre)
7. Border: negotiation and the performance of elsewhere (e.g. performance at sites of continuous contestation, intraculturalism)
8. Religion: re-embodiment and the performance of history (e.g. rites, pageants and passion plays)
9. Carnival: regeneratio and the performance of optimism (e.g. celebration, feasting and food)
10. Death: commemoration and the performance of absence (e.g. rites and rituals, extreme body art)

The lectures will be staged as multi-media presentations including video and data projection.

Criteria for Assessment :

i] Written essay : in assessing the essay, the examiner will expect:
- an appreciation and application of the interdisciplinary analytical approaches presented in the module (30% of the overall essay mark)
- an understanding of the ramifications of social, cultural and historical context upon the form and function of performance as presented in the module (30%)
- an ability to sustain an intellectual argument for the duration of the essay (15%)
- evidence of individual research and reading in addition to lecture material (15%)
- appropriate presentation, including bibliography (10%)

ii] Performed essay : in assessing the performed essay, the examiners will expect:
- a creative application of dramaturgical procedures in the rearticulation of essay material (25% of the overall performed essay mark)
- imaginative, intellectual reworking of academic argument (25%)
- an understanding of the relationship of the material to the new spatio- temporal context (30%)
- clarity of exposition (10%)
- persuasiveness of presentation (10%)

Transferable skills

Transferable skills :

- presentation of argument in an assured and confident manner through live exposition
- the reworking and presentation of academic argument through live exposition.
- self-discipline and reflexive functioning in rearticulating personally generated material.

Reading Lists

Books
** Recommended Text
Fusco, C. (1999) Corpus Delecti. Performance Art of the Americas Routledge
Kershaw, B (1993) The Politics of Performance: Radical Theatre as Cultural Intervention Routledge
Rogoff, I (2000) Terra infirma: geography's visual culture Routledge
Schechner, R (2002) Performance Studies - An Introduction Routledge
Gomez-Pena, Guillermo (2000) Dangerous Border Crossings Routledge
Kastner, Jeffery and Wallis Brian (eds) (1998) Land and Environment Art Phaidon
Miles, Malcolm et al. (eds) (2000) The City Cultures Reader Routledge
Read, Alan (1995) Theatre and Everyday Life Routledge

Notes

This module is at CQFW Level 5