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"Crucible Bodies" is one of the first full-length studies of Japanese performance culture. It covers a wide range of historical and theoretical topics, from Brecht in Japan to childrens bodies in postmodern Japanese performances, from the notion of beauty in contemporary cultural theory to practical and theoretical readings of more recent intercultural performances, involving not only Japanese but also other Asian theatre practitioners.
List of contents
1. Political Displacements: Toward Historicizing Brecht in Japan, 1932-19982. Images of Armageddon: Japan's 1980's Theatre CultureInterlude 1: "Beauty" in Modern and Postmodern Japan3. Deconstructing "Japaneseness": Toward Articulating Locality and Hybridity in Contemporary Japanese Performance4. Playing Betwixt and Between; Intercultural Performance in the age of GlobalizationInterlude 2: "Fictional Body vs. Junk Body: Thinking through Performing Body in Japan, or Why Greek Ancient Drama is Produced? 5. Post, Post-Modernism and Junk: Murakami Takashi and "J" Theatre 6. Globality's Children: The "Child's Body" as Strategy of Flatness in Performance Interlude 3: Nationalism, Intra-nationalism: Re-imagining the Boundary7. Zapping/Mapping "J" theatre8. Miyazawa Akio after 9.11Epilogue: Interculturalism Revisited after 9.11
About the author
Tadashi Uchino is Professor of Performance Studies at the Department of Interdisciplinary Cultural Studies, University of Tokyo. Widely published in Japanese, he is also a contributing editor for TDR.
Summary
One of the full-length studies of Japanese performance culture, this book covers a wide range of historical and theoretical topics, from Brecht in Japan to 'children's' bodies in postmodern Japanese performances, from the notion of beauty in contemporary cultural theory to practical and theoretical readings of other intercultural performances.
