Overview

In this second edition, the author opens with a discussion of important developments in the discipline. His closing chapter, 'Global and Intercultural Performance', is completely rewritten in light of the post-9/11 world. Fully revised chapters with new examples, biographies and source material provide a lively, easily accessible overview of the full range of performance for undergraduates at all levels in performance studies, theatre, performing arts and cultural studies. Among the topics discussed are the performing arts and popular entertainments, rituals, play and games as well as the performances of everyday life. Supporting examples and ideas are drawn from the social sciences, performing arts, post-structuralism, ritual theory, ethology, philosophy and aesthetics. User-friendly, with a special text design, Performance Studies: An Introduction also includes the following features: numerous extracts from primary sources giving alternative voices and viewpoints biographies of key thinkers student activities to stimulate fieldwork, classroom exercises and discussion key reading lists for each chapter twenty line drawings and 202 photographs drawn from private and public collections around the world.

Full Product Details

9780415372459

Table of Contents

Reviews

'Performance Studies: An Introduction marks the coming of age of performance studies not just as an acknowledged field of study but as an influential anti-discipline.' - James Harding, Theatre Journal 'A very effective summary of a lifetime of major creative and scholarly experiment that is almost certainly already having a major influence on numerous students in many drama, theatre, and performance studies departments in colleges and universities around the world.' - Baz Kershaw, New Theatre Quarterly 'Richard Schechner's work is crucial to exploring the tricky and sometimes dangerous territories of performance. Not only is he responsible for continually expanding the boundaries of the field but also for demystifying esoteric issues. His work reaches wide constituencies. Through his writings, I always discover new ways of looking at performance, and through performance at the world at large. His thoughts always renew my desire to change the world. - Guillermo Gomez-Pena, performance artist and writer, San Francisco 'This fecund and useful volume sets up lively possibilities for exploring the entire spectrum of behaviors, restored or otherwise that Schechner as scholar, editor, and practitioner, has been sorting out for years with an enterprising spirit that now defines performance studies.' - Herbert Blau, University of Washington, Seattle 'An appropriately broad-ranging, challenging, and provocative introduction, equally important for practicing artists as for students and scholars of the performing arts.' - Phillip Zarrilli, University of Exeter 'This isn't merely the musings of a theatre director who never stops innovating. It is a global thinker's striking, historic way of understanding human nature from a surprisingly practical perspective, which can be adapted in countless areas at numerous levels.' - Sun Huizhu, Professor of Drama, Shanghai Theatre Academy 'Exactly what I have longed for. It provides linkages between concepts, gives historical perspective, and explains theoretical ideas in a language accessible to undergraduate students. It will be required reading.' - Takahashi Yuichiro, Dokkyo University, Hyogo 'Well written, thoughtful and provocative. An essential purchase.' - Sally Harrison-Pepper, Miami University 'This textbook is excellent and sure to excite classroom discussion. Whether teaching World Theatre or Performance Theory, it provides a provocative guide to questions that arise when performance is approached in a global perspective. I will certainly adopt it in my classroom.' - Rebecca Schneider, Cornell University 'The text is very cleverly put together with a clear idea of how its features contribute to the reading of the material. I frankly cannot imagine it being done better.' - Simon Shepherd, Central School of Speech and Drama, London 'It will make the teaching of performance studies a lot easier.' - Colin Counsell, University of North London 'A very effective summary of a lifetime of major creative and scholarly experiment.' - New Theatre Quarterly

Author Information

Richard Schechner is a pioneer of Performance Studies. A scholar, theatre director, editor, and playwright he is University Professor of Performance Studies at the Tisch School of the Arts at New York University and Editor of TDR: The Journal of Performance Studies. He is the author of Public Domain (1969), Environmental Theater (1973), The End of Humanism (1982), Performance Theory (2003, Routledge), Between Theater and Anthropology (1985), The Future of Ritual (1993, Routledge), and Over, Under, and Around: Essays on Performance and Culture (2004). His books have been translated into French, Spanish, Korean, Chinese, Japanese, Serbo-Croat, German, Italian, Hungarian, Bulgarian and Polish. He is the general editor of the Worlds of Performance series published by Routledge and the co-editor of the Enactments series published by Seagull Books.

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