The Veterans Project and Odyssey Home: Embodied Historiography Through Performance
- Submitting institution
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University of Portsmouth
- Unit of assessment
- 33 - Music, Drama, Dance, Performing Arts, Film and Screen Studies
- Output identifier
- 26322649
- Type
- T - Other
- DOI
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-
- Location
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- Brief description of type
- A multi-component output that consists of two performance-research projects (encompassing twelve different performances and two playscripts) and two journal articles
- Open access status
- -
- Month
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- Year
- 2018
- URL
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-
- Supplementary information
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- Request cross-referral to
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- Output has been delayed by COVID-19
- No
- COVID-19 affected output statement
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- Forensic science
- No
- Criminology
- No
- Interdisciplinary
- No
- Number of additional authors
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0
- Research group(s)
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B - Music, Dance, Drama and Performing Arts
- Proposed double-weighted
- No
- Reserve for an output with double weighting
- No
- Additional information
- This MULTI-COMPONENT output comprises two performance-research projects (encompassing twelve different performances and two playscripts) and two journal articles. Documentation submitted via USB drive can be requested from the REF archive. The output fuses performance, oral history, and cultural studies methodologies and develops Hughes’ concept of ‘embodied historiography’ to investigate how live performance can blur the line between historical subject and historian, challenging established narratives around historical events. Embodied historiography builds upon and greatly expands the work of performance studies scholar Freddie Rokem and oral historian Michael Frisch. It suggests that performance can reorganize the subjective processing of collective memory and historical events through the live layering of multiple perspectives. This is tested through practice with military veterans from the US and UK Armed Forces who have served in nearly every branch and major site of military conflict since the Vietnam War. These performers — who do not act in a role but perform as themselves onstage — are understood as historical documents and audiences are positioned as historians. The research thus investigates how live performance disrupts monolithic and uniform discourses surrounding lived experiences.
All performances within the two performance-research projects were directed by Hughes. The Veterans Project was a series of nine unscripted performances in which veterans shared their experiences in an improvised setting alongside photographs, iconography, material culture objects (uniforms, medals, equipment, etc.) and video excerpts. One of the component journal articles was co-authored with a collaborator who addressed the technical dimensions. Odyssey Home was a series of three scripted performances that combined the writing of military veterans (either produced purposefully for performance or excerpted from letters and journal entries) with text from Homer’s Odyssey. The two performance scripts, edited by Hughes and a performer/collaborator for the Odyssey Home series, are included as parts of that component.
- Author contribution statement
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- Non-English
- No
- English abstract
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