Studies in Performing Arts & Media

Geschiedenis

S:PAM - Studies in Performing Arts & Media is the research unit of the Theatre, Performance and Media Studies team of Ghent University, led by professors Christel Stalpaert and Katharina Pewny.
S:PAM deliberately includes Theatre Studies and Performance Studies as dialoguing entities in the disciplinary, methodological and political/ethical questions it poses. These two disciplines have moved towards one another, but still one cannot deny that they emerged from a different tradition. Since the sixties, vigorous debate existed between continental European Theatre Studies on the one hand and American Performance Studies on the other hand. Performance Studies claimed to challenge the institutional norms of higher education with research-through-practice and reproached Theatre Studies for not doing so. Performance Studies is said to be transnational whereas Theatre Studies is seen as conducting rather national research. Theatre Studies is said to study the drama text in the process of theatrical production, while Performance Studies is said to study performativity in a broader cultural analysis. It has become clear, however, that a strict division between the two fields and the two paradigms is no longer possible. Continental poststructuralist philosophers have strongly influenced the political questions tackled in Performance Studies and with Hans-Thies Lehmann’s Postdramatic Theatre it has become clear that Theatre Studies also includes the study of the performance text.

Theatre Studies has a rich tradition of historical research. S:PAM has these methodological issues dialogue with the concept of performativity. Dealing with the aesthetic implications of the performing body in historical and contemporary performing arts is a particular challenge for S:PAM.

A transdisciplinary approach hence gears S:PAM research. Drama texts, theatre performances, music theatre, dance theatre, opera, ballet, modern and new media, popular theatre forms like variety theatre and music hall, and even broader cultural manifestations like fireworks, public ceremonies, royal entries, etc, are the topics of research.

The relation of the “own” and the “other” in performance, the issues of subjectivity, as well as racial and gender identity, are important issues in S:PAM research practice, which is clustered around five main focuses: Technologies; Memories, Traumata & Conflicts; Histories; Dramaturgies and Practices.