Where the People Are? Workshop on People's Theatre in Inter-Asian Society, December 13-15, 2018

Organizers: The International Center for Cultural Studies (ICCS), National Chiao Tung University (NCTU). The International Institute for Cultural Studies (IICS), University System of Taiwan (UST). Institute of Social Research and Cultural Studies, National Chiao Tung University (NCTU)

Location: Room 210, HA Building 2, National Chiao Tung University, 1001 University Road, Hsinchu City, Taiwan

Date: December 13-15, 2018

Registration deadline: December 10, 2018

Workshop Description and Objectives

People’s Theater is theater of the people, made by the people, speaks for the people, and it exists in different historical formations. In Le Théâtre du peuple, published in 1918, Romain Rolland believes that the State belongs to history but the People belong to the present. The theater for the state and the royal court had come to an end, and theater for the people emerged during the period of French Revolution and Russian Revolution. Diverse groups such as the People’s Theater and Popular Theater have appeared globally in twentieth century, marking multiple trajectories of social political situations. The most representative ones include Augusto Boal’s Theater of the Oppressed in Latin America, Theater for Development in Africa, Philippines Educational Theater Association in South East Asia, Madang Theater, and Tent Theater in South Korea and Japan. Over the past three decades, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Thailand, Singapore, Malaysia, India and Mainland China
have also developed different forms of People’s Theater.

Facing tumultuous changes in the twenty-first century, including the prevalence of transnational capitalism, the rise of right-wing nationalism, and the intensification of social class differentiation, we would like to invite the practitioners and researchers in different Asian areas to share their experience in diverse historical and social conditions. We intend to delineate the spectrum of People’s Theater in Taiwan, Hong Kong, Mainland China, Japan, Korea, Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines, and Thailand by expanding on the potential of discourse and praxis of People’s Theater under the challenging status quo.

We intend to discuss the following questions: How did the praxis of People’s Theater locate themselves within heterogeneous contexts of development in different regions for the past thirty years? How do they define the methods and objects of resistance? How do they apply local elements to develop their theater aesthetics? Did they change the working methods of theater practice to adapt to the historical moments? Where are the oppressed and the people that they have been working with in the present theater practice?

Registration

To register for this event, please visit the online registration form available here. Please note that the registration deadline is December 10, 2018.

*simultaneous interpretation provided

More information, including a detailed schedule and agenda, is available on the project website here.