There Is Such a Thing: Feminist Mimesis in Contemporary Performance in the UK
- Submitting institution
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Royal Conservatoire of Scotland
- Unit of assessment
- 33 - Music, Drama, Dance, Performing Arts, Film and Screen Studies
- Output identifier
- 2400727
- Type
- D - Journal article
- DOI
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10.1080/10486801.2018.1511548
- Title of journal
- Contemporary Theatre Review
- Article number
- -
- First page
- 522
- Volume
- 28
- Issue
- 4
- ISSN
- 1477-2264
- Open access status
- Not compliant
- Month of publication
- January
- Year of publication
- 2019
- URL
-
-
- Supplementary information
-
-
- Request cross-referral to
- -
- Output has been delayed by COVID-19
- No
- COVID-19 affected output statement
- -
- Forensic science
- No
- Criminology
- No
- Interdisciplinary
- No
- Number of additional authors
-
0
- Research group(s)
-
-
- Proposed double-weighted
- No
- Reserve for an output with double weighting
- No
- Additional information
- This article takes an explicitly feminist perspective on (at the time) recent political events which were being explored, captured or debated through contemporary performance. Using a feminist methodology drawn from Elin Diamond’s 'Unmaking Mimesis' (from which the title of this piece is derived), this article argues that through mimesis, re-iteration, re-performance and reimagining, there is such a thing as feminist praxis. Performance analysis of performances that took place in Glasgow over a fortnight in 2016 is used to explore how feminist readings of these works offer potential political reimaginings.
Situating itself within the field of feminist performance studies and drawing upon a range of sources from this field, the article also engages with discussions surrounding capitalism and other feminisms to use an intersectional approach.
I explore whether Diamond’s assertions about feminist mimesis are still pertinent twenty years after the publication of her text. I was able to use contemporary case studies to evidence ways in which feminist praxis is holding up a mirror to recent political events and explore the roles that contemporary performance and live art can have in understanding a political moment and asking questions about political leadership.
This article builds on an earlier discussion around political performance co-authored by David Overend in 2015 (also included in this submission). It is part of a continuing strand of work exploring the capacity (and role) of contemporary performance in being responsive to “the now”. What began with writing about the Scottish Referendum for an article in 2015, progressed to this work, and I am currently working on an edited collection, 'Performance in a Pandemic', as the most recent iteration of this. This article was authored solely by me but my work in this area is frequently collaborative (David Overend, 2015 and Lucy Weir 2020-21).
- Author contribution statement
- -
- Non-English
- No
- English abstract
- -