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Recenzja książki Mirosława Kocura, Źródła teatru (Wrocław 2013)

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Steiner M.

Pamiętnik Teatralny

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2015

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vol. 64

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issue 1(253)

156-160

EN

The book Źródła teatru (‘Sources of Theatre’) by Mirosław Kocur is a good example of how findings of performance studies can be put to use. The tome begins and closes with case stud-ies on contemporary liturgical performances on Bali and in Tibet, and within this frame, large-format, diachronic chapters that amass multicultural material in explaining the origins of the performer, theatre house, or drama have been placed. In his quick-paced and exceptionally interesting narration, the author posits questions about what and how happened without insisting on seeking meanings at any price, because performance studies enables one to tackle visualness in terms of a unique event which is irre-ducible to theatrical script. Perhaps the part concerning performances in Palaeolithic caves seems to be the most valuable one. Instead of speculating what the famous cave paintings depicting men-beasts mean, as theatre historians usually do, Kocur proposes to conceive the cave itself as periper-sonal space. Such phenomena as neural plasticity and neural mirroring made it possible for John Onians to interpret cave paintings as ways in which Palaeolithic hunters imitated their game. Kocur is fascinated with this conception and develops it further quite creatively. To him, Palaeoperformances are “transformances” as well. The use of the latest international literature, interdisciplinary character and breadth of the studies conducted by the author may be cited as other substantial advantages of the book.

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Rozważania o teatrologii. Próba opisu sytuacji

80%

Pamiętnik Teatralny

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2014

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vol. 63

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issue 1-2(249-250)

55-64

EN

In order to determine what has happened with Polish theatrology and what the chances of changing its situation are, one needs to go back to the year 1913, to the programmatic text Nowy kierunek badań teatrologicznych (A New Direction in Theatrological Research) by Leon Schiller, and take a look at the origins of the discipline in high modernist thought. It is so, because theatrology owed its existence to the so-called high modernism that conceived it as a high cognitive act having an autonomous art as its object, which had its correlate in the concept of autonomous aesthetic experience. Aesthetics constituted a line of defence against commercialisation of art, and institution became the new discipline’s hero. Theatrology was founded on several myths, which in turn formed its prison: they included the myth of the theatre as a temple of art, the myth of pure art, and the summaries myth of the auratic work of art. Thus, the process of its transformations had to be triggered by the changes taking place in the artistic reality, i.e. by art itself and by aesthetics, which turned into anaesthetics; it had to become dependent on the development of new media, the emergence of new relations between man and technology, the validation of everyday life, and a number of related turns and breakthroughs in various fields of academic research and science. All of this has resulted in reconfiguring the discipline of theatrology and expanding its borders. A rough outline of the fields claimed and cultivated by today’s theatrology looks interesting. There are two types of historical research: one that prolongs the existence of the old history of theatre, still closed within the walls of institutions and aesthetics, which I call the history of the first degree; and a new history of the second degree, consisting of various other historical narratives, in which theatre turns out to be a phenomenon encompassing diverse regions of activity and collective consciousness. Recent years have also shaped a broad field of new theatrology understood as an inter-discipline of maximally inclusive character, with multiple lines of research and different methodologies. Finally, a trans-disciplinary area of hybrid character has emerged, where, for example, performatics can be located. By summing up all the various tendencies present in our current research practice we can see that the big picture consists of dynamic and mobile lines of inquiry, very attractive in the multitude of possibilities it offers, which is a cultural consequence of the time.

3

Dyscyplina po przejściach. O strategiach badań teatrologicznych

80%

Wachowski J.

Pamiętnik Teatralny

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2014

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vol. 63

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issue 1-2(249-250)

65-76

EN

New challenges that theatre studies had to face in the last decades inspire one to ponder on some basic questions: What is the contemporary theatre? And in what directions is today’s acting heading? But also: How has the status of the theatre performance changed under the influence of new technologies (most notably by the means of its recording and transmission, and their presence within the performances themselves)? The answers to these (and other) questions provided by theatre scholars lead to the conclusion that we can talk about at least four distinct ways – epistemic paradigms, as it were – of tackling such issues within the discourse of theatre studies. The first may be called inclusive theatrology. Its source is the belief that everything is theatre and theatre is everywhere. The second position may be called exclusive theatrology. It originates in understanding theatre in a narrow sense, which enables one to discriminate between theatre and other spectacles (and exclude theatre from the discourse about them). The third way is of interdisciplinary character (it means constructing a discourse that is a confluence of disciplines, or to be more exact, methodological positions; there can, obviously, be several of them). The fourth, trans-disciplinary, stance seeks out narratives summaries breaking away from the customary theatrocentrism of the scholars (and readers). It is aimed at supporting independent methods of inquiry, i.e. those devoid of any methodological (often dogmatic and a priori) assumptions. Its aim is not to produce methodological-and-epistemic contaminations, but to broaden the scope of research by shedding multi-disciplinary bands of light to see the things “caughtin-between” that would otherwise go unnoticed. It seems that it is this trans-disciplinary approach that holds the most promise for theatre studies not only because it is a breeze of fresh air that broadens the scope of theatrological research and renews the discourse, but also because it brings about a change in what is meant by criteria for academic scholarship. It redefines old concepts and customary notions (relating to the scope of research and its tools), replacing them with new methodological categories. It aims at a discourse open to cognitive inspiration and responding to challenges resulting from the developments in the humanities of today.

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3 Pamiętnik Teatralny

1 2015

2 2014

1 Steiner M.

1 Wachowski J.

Recenzja książki Mirosława Kocura, Źródła teatru (Wrocław 2013)

Rozważania o teatrologii. Próba opisu sytuacji

Dyscyplina po przejściach. O strategiach badań teatrologicznych