SYLLABUS

Thurs. Sept. 7:  Opening Class
Why do humans (and others) "perform"? What are theatres? And how do/should/can we limit the terrain of the "theatrical" in relationship to something that might be termed "reality"? Is "theatre theory" a redundancy? The English word “theory” comes from the Greek “theoria,” meaning contemplation, speculation, or sight. It is related to the word “theatron,” or place for viewing – the theater. Theater and theory are kin. Is this the case around the world? What happens to theatre over time? What can we know of prehistoric practices, let alone ancient or medieval. What of performance remains? And, is theatre itself a time machine? We will ask the essential question: Why learn about theatre history and historical theatricality? And what do dance, music, visual art and architecture have to do with what we will be studying this semester?


Section 1: Orienting Questions to "Prehistory" and "Origins"
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Tues. Sept. 12: What is Performance?
Suzan-Lori Parks, The America Play and short remarks by Parks on her style
Also, a brief essay by Shonni Enelow on contemporary film acting styles
Recommended: two essays from American Theatre magazine

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Thurs. Sept. 14: Performance in/as Culture: The Cockfight
Clifford Geertz, selection from The Interpretation of Cultures
John Emigh, selection from The Cambridge Companion to Performance Studies
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Tues. Sept. 19: Counter-Mimicry, or Performance Across Cultures 
Wole Soyinka, Death and the King’s Horseman
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Thurs. Sept. 21:  Are There Performance Universals?  What is at stake in some efforts to find universals and what might be some problems with or promises in such efforts? 
Eugenio Barba, Dictionary of Theatre Anthropology

A play from the canon of Japanese Noh Theatre: Dojoji
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Thues. Sept. 26: Prehistory, Performance, and “Origin Rituals” 
Watch:  The Werner Herzog film Cave of Forgotten Dreams  through OCRA
An outmoded 1959 theatre history textbook Living Theatre, selection

a brief selection from Martin Bernal Black Athena

Richard Schechner, selection from Performance Theory

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Thurs. Sept. 28:   Masks, Ancestors, "Primitivity" – Possession vs. Representation

Jean Clottes and David Lewis-Williams, The Shamans of Prehistory, selection
Selection from John Emigh Masked Performance
Chief Robert Joseph, "Behind the Mask," Down from the Shimmering Sky 

Cara McCarty, "Offense/Defense" in Masks: Faces of Culture

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Tues, Oct. 3: Performance and Economy

David Kertzer, “The Superbowl’s Strange Tribe” 

Maurya Wickstrom on The Lion King 
Karl Marx, "The Secret of Commodities" 
GROUP ONE TO PERFORM

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Section 2: The Ancient Mediterranean
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Thurs. Oct. 5:  Ancient Mediterranean Africa

Ronald J. Leprohon, "Ritual Drama in Ancient Egypt."
 The Triumph of Horus
Jan Assmann, Death and Salvation in Ancient Egypt, selection

Guest visit by Kenneth Molloy 

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Tues. Oct. 10:   The Theatre of Dionysus
Euripides, The Bakkhai
David Wiles, Greek Theater Performance, chapters 1 and 2.
(Be sure to note the assignment ) 
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Thurs. Oct. 12: Greek Comedy
Aristophanes, Thesmophoriazusae 
Wiles, chapters 3 and 4, and Sue-Ellen Case on "Classic Drag"
GROUP THREE TO PERFORM
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Tues. Oct. 17: Plato and Aristotle on Mimesis
Plato, The Republic: Books 7 and 10.
Plato, Ion (excerpt on OCRA)
Aristotle,  The Poetics of Aristotle
Wiles, chapter 5.
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Thurs. Oct. 19:  Multiple Medeas
Euripides Medea
Seneca Medea
GROUP FOUR TO PERFORM 
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Tues. Oct. 24:  Roman Empire 
A. M. Nagler, Sourcebook in Theatrical History

Odai Johnson, "Unspeakable Histories: Terror, Spectacle, and Genocidal Memory"
Plautus, The Captives

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Thurs, Oct. 26: MIDTERM EXAM

Midterm study sheet now posted!! 
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Section 3: South Asia 

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Tues. Oct. 31:    The Performative Bases of Ancient Indian Theatre and Dance

Bharat-Muni, selections from the Natyasatra
John Emigh, Summary Notes on Bhava and Rasa
Sreenath Nair, "Introduction: The Natyashastra and the Body in the Natyasastra"
Daniel Meyer-Dikgrafe, "Indian Theatre Aesthetics" in Theatre and Consciousness
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Thurs. Nov. 2: Kuttiyattam and Kathakali
Reread Natyasastra from the last class.
Suresh Awasthi, “The Temple as Theatre”
Phillip B. Zarrilli, Kathakali: Dance-Drama
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Tues. Nov. 7: Kalidasa's Sakuntala

Kalidasa, Sakuntala in Theater for Memory
Barbara Stoler Miller, Theater of Memory, selection

GROUP FIVE TO PERFORM

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Section 4: Africa
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Thurs. Nov. 9:  Performance Legacies of Pre-Colonial Africa 1  
Kole Omotoso, "Concepts of History and Theatre in Africa"
Wole Soyinka, "The Fourth Stage" in Art, Dialogue, and Outrage. 
Margaret Thompson Drewal, Yoruba Ritual, selection
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Tues. Nov. 14: Performance Legacies of Pre-Colonial Africa 2
Malidoma Patrice Some, Ritual: Power, Healing, Community, selection.
N'gugi wa Thiongo, "Enactments of Power: The Politics of Performance Space."    
David Kerr, African Popular Theatre, selection 
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 Thursday. Nov 16:  African Performance in Global Perspective
Visit from Professor Jasmine Johnson
Read: Doris Green, "Traditional Dance in Africa" 
GROUP SIX TO PERFORM (Group six also asks that you watch this video before class)

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Section 5: Medieval Europe and the "New" World 

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Tues. Nov. 21:  Holy Roman Empire
Saint Augustine and Tertullian
Quem Quertis and Hrosvit 

John Spaulding Gatton, "There Must Be Blood" 
Andrew Sofer, The Stage Life of Props 

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Tues. Nov. 28: Carnival, Mumming, Farce 
The Farce of the Fart

A Christmas Mumming, The Play of St. George
Mikail Bahktin, "On Popular Festive Forms"in Rabelais and His World

Final paper option proposal due. 

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Thurs. Nov. 30:  Corpus Christi and the Inka
Carolyn Dean, Inka Bodies and the Body of Christ
Moltolina, History of the Indians of New Spain
Grads: Leo Cabranes Grant, "From Scenarios to Networks"
GROUP SIX TO PERFORM
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Tues. Dec. 5: Old World New World "Visions"

Shakespeare, The Tempest and Black Elk Speaks
Recommended: Dancing on Our Turtle's Back, by Leanne Simpson
Grads, "This Thing of Darkness I Acknowledge Mine"

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December 12:  Final Exam, 10:30 in 007 Lyman Hall.
Study sheet will IS NOW AVAILABLE HERE!
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Course Objectives and Requirements

Objectives

1. This class is designed to introduce students to performance theory and basic performance studies texts as a way to approach both the challenges of charting performance history and the comparison of performance forms across culture. We will explore theatre history from the Paleolithic through to the Medieval, with focus on Europe, Asia, Africa and some material from the Americas.

2. To stimulate rigorous questions about the functions of performance in the generation, propagation, and/or negotiations of culture(s). Theatre, dance, ritual, and forms of play/game are all considered.

3. To introduce students to various global performance forms in historical context, and apply performance theory in engagement with historical material.

4. To encourage students to work to identify the social assumptions informing as well as generated by various theatrical practices (such as the stage/house divide, practices of duration, ritual aspects, levels of codification, levels of improvisation, etc.).

5. To explore pre-historical, ancient, and medieval performance practices while considering the limits of these temporal categories globally.

6. To interrogate traditional historiographical reliance on written forms or archival remains over embodied practices.


Requirements

This course will be based on lecture and in-class discussion of the material we read and, in some cases, view. Due to the broad amount of cultural and historical material covered by this survey, it is essential that students attend all classes and complete all readings.  YOU MUST BRING THE READINGS IN PAPER FORM TO CLASS. You can share printed material, but a paper copy must be in every other student's hand during class. If you choose a partner at the beginning of the term you can plan accordingly.  No computers or cell phones can be used during class. I also strongly recommend reading from print and taking reading notes by pen or pencil. For some of my reasoning toward this decision, read this Washington Post article from April 2014.  Other studies have shown that note taking on a computer during a lecture is not as effective and handwritten notes. Coming to class without readings will result in a mark of absent after two times.

Undergraduate students:

Exams and general requirements: There are two exams and an in-class group performance for this class (though if you prefer a final paper to a final exam see the option in the next paragraph). Reading responses are also required. It is unlikely that I will administer pop quizzes, but it is possible if discussion lags and reading preparedness seems duller than usual.  The midterm and final are both short essay form. The midterm will be on October 26 in class.  The final will be after the reading period on December 12 during the class hour in Lyman 007.

For those who prefer to write a final paper and go into depth on one topic there is a final paper option instead of the final exam. See the parameters for that paper here. Note that a proposal for that option is due beforehand, Nov. 29, in order for this option to be acceptable. 

Performance project: This is a group-based class presentation of research as performance. The performance part of the presentation should take no more than 10 minutes.  Your group will have time to then discuss research and take questions from the class. The best possible format would be a performance followed by a structured discussion based on questions that you pose. Either way, I expect careful research on the period/style as well as  theoretical clarity in a piece that is creatively presented and well thought out. The whole group of you should arrange to meet with the Professor or the T.A. a couple of weeks beforehand so that we can talk about the presentation and plan accordingly. Office hours or staying after-class for a brief discussion can work for this.  See the Group Performance link for more on the pedagogical intention of this project.

Attendance and reading reports: You will be required to write a reading response of a reading response, roughly 150-250 words in length (about half to one page), for each class, posted to the Canvas class site.  Please respond to the questions posted for each day on the syllablog.  While attendance only forms 20% of the grade, having more than two (2) absences over the course of the semester will adversely affect your grade. More than 4 absences may constitute failure. Only illnesses, religious holidays and family emergencies constitute excused absences. Please see me immediately if you are having problems with attending or doing the work for the course. Consistent tardiness may be counted as absences in some cases. Please act accordingly.

NOTE:  I discourage theatre arts and performance studies concentrators from taking this course S/NC. Please note that S/NC students must have at least 70% attendance and turn in 70% of the response papers, in addition to full completion of the other class requirements, to pass the class. Students who do not meet these requirements will fail to receive credit for the class.

Extra credit, non-required paper: For undergrads, if you would like to write a paper on any topic pertaining to this class that will allow you to do further research and present it to the professor, feel free to email me with the paper and I will consider it for extra credit. This paper should be no more than five pages and can be due  by 5pm on December 15 and must be emailed to Rebecca_Schneider@brown.edu.

Grading for Undergraduates:

Performance Projects: 20%

Attendance/reading reports: 20% (if a student is perennially tardy, or misses more than 6 readers reports, this percentage will increase)

Midterm: 30%

Final exam: 30%
The extra credit paper can bring your grade up 1/2 a mark if it receives a B or higher.  So, a B would become a B+, a B+ would become an A-.

Books can be bought at the bookstore (see link to book order). But all books are also on reserve at the Rock (in 2016 the reserve books may not be ready until mid September). All other reserves are available as PDFs or links on OCRA. Some PDFs are on the Canvas site. If you can't find it at OCRA, check Canvas. And remember: you must have a paper copy in class,  or share with only 1 other person.

Note: No in-class recording of lectures or other classroom activities is allowed without permission in advance. 

Graduate Students:

Complete all required and recommended reading for each class. No reading response papers required. Full participation in discussion, with sensitivity to the general level of the class. That is, graduate students should enable undergraduates (and thus assist the professor) in the arc of class discussion.

Graduate students will give one in-class oral presentation during the semester, to be worked out with the Professor. In addition, class on November 24 will be run by the TA and the graduate students, more on this in person.  

Graduate students will write a 15-20 page research paper due December 15 and emailed to me. Please provide me with an abstract and preliminary bibliography for this paper by Nov. 1. I would also like to have you pass in an annotated bibliography of at least 5 additional performance theory texts or collections (you may pass in up to 10) and a "performance theory" bibliography of 30-40 books that you craft over the semester. We can discuss this further. For the first few weeks there will be prompts for "graduate students" on the syllabus pages, but after that I will assume that your bibliography building and reading is independently underway. Meet with me during office hours (or by appt) at some point in the semester to discuss the annotated text selection. The annotations should be up to 1 page in length (no more), requiring at least five pages in total. The annotations and bibliography are due by December 10.

Attendance/Participation 20%
Expanded annotated reading bibliography in Performance Theory 20%               

Research Paper: 60% 

Academic Code for ALL STUDENTS:

Below is a statement on Brown’s Academic Code. Please feel free to ask many any questions about the code or proper citation for your research projects. I will not tolerate academic dishonesty.

Norms regarding the quality and originality of academic work are often much more stringent and demanding in college than they are in high school. All Brown students are responsible for understanding and following Brown's academic code, which is described below.

Academic achievement is ordinarily evaluated on the basis of work that a student produces independently. Students who submit academic work that uses others' ideas, words, research, or images without proper attribution and documentation are in violation of the academic code. Infringement of the academic code entails penalties ranging from reprimand to suspension, dismissal, or expulsion from the University.

Brown students are expected to tell the truth. Misrepresentations of facts, significant omissions, or falsifications in any connection with the academic process (including change of course permits, the academic transcript, or applications for graduate training or employment) violate the code, and students are penalized accordingly. This policy also applies to Brown alums, insofar as it relates to Brown transcripts and other records of work at Brown.

Misunderstanding the code is not an excuse for dishonest work. Students who are unsure about any point of Brown's academic code should consult their courses instructors or an academic dean, who will be happy to explain the policy.

STATEMENT REGARDING COMFORT LEVELS WITH MATERIAL THAT MAY BE GRAPHIC OR OTHERWISE EXPLICIT IN TERMS OF GENDER, RACE, CLASS, TRAUMA, RELIGION, EATING HABITS, VIOLENCE, SEX, AND OTHER CATEGORIES:  All of the material in this class may be difficult for someone – difficulty is, in fact, part of what we will explore. There is, historically, a lot of violence in theatre -- even in comedies. There are rape scenes in theatre, beheadings, bestiality, everyone is almost always transgender (or trans-person) in many places and many times and we will engage with this material in a forthright manner. In the medieval period, for example, there is a very large amount of blood split in the name of Christ, and anti-Semitism on the part of early Christians. And the Roman empire has a long arm – arguably reaching us here where we sit today – so we will not always discuss attitudes, practices, worldviews as of a distant past. This material clearly could "trigger" emotional responses. Theatre is often about the triggering of emotional responses, and you may find yourself in the theatre.  There is brutal slavery in the ancient world, both pagan and Christian. There are open attitudes to sexuality in many parts of the world that we discuss, including "two spirits" in Native America, etc. Please see the Professor in advance, or at any time, regarding questions or concerns.

 

Book Order

Book Order
Highly Recommended to Purchase:
Note: The bookstore will list as required, but all books are also available at the Rock.

Aristotle. The Poetics of Aristotle. Translation and Commentary by Stephen Halliwell. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1987. ISBN 0807817635 - $25.00

Barba, Eugenio and Nicola Savarese. A Dictionary of Theatre Anthropology: The Secret Art of the Performer. New York: Routledge, 1991. ISBN: 0415053080 - $86.95


Connerton, Paul. How Societies Remember. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989.  ISBN: 0521270936 -- from $4.00 - $22.00
Corrigan, Robert. Classical tragedy, Greek and Roman: 8 plays. Hal Leonard Corporation, 1990.
ISBN 1557830460, 9781557830463 - $18.99

Dean, Carolyn. Inka Bodies and the Body of Christ : Corpus Christi In Colonial Cuzco, Peru. Durham [N.C.]: Duke University Press, 1999. - $24.95

Drewal, Margaret
Yoruban Ritual. Bloomington: Ind. U Press, 1992. ISBN: 0253206847. OUT OF PRINT. VERY FEW COPIES. YOU MAY HAVE TO SEARCH THE WEB OR READ AT ROCK AS THE BOOKSTORE MAY NOT CARRY. - $19.95

Gassner, John. Medieval and Tudor Drama. New York: Applause Books, 2000. ISBN-10: 0936839848 - $17.99

Henderson, Jeffrey. Three Plays by Aristophanes : Staging Women. New York: Routledge, 1996. ISBN: 0415907446 - $44.95

Miller, Barbara Stoller. The Theater of Memory: The Plays of Kalidasa. New York: Columbia University Press, 1984. ISBN: 023105839X - $45.00

Parks, Suzan-Lori. The America Play, and Other Works. New York: Theatre Communications Group, 1995. - $15.95

Shakespeare, William. The Tempest. Signet. ISBN: 0451527127 - $4.95

Soyinka, Wole. Death and the King's Horseman. W. W. Norton, 2002. ISBN: 0393977617 - $20.70

Wiles, David. Greek Theatre Performance: An Introduction. New York: Cambridge, 2000. ISBN: 0521648572. - $49.99

Recommended to Purchase:



Geertz, Clifford

2000 The Interpretation of Cultures. New York: Basic Books.


Enders, Jody

2002 Theatre of Cruelty. Cornell University Press, 2002. ISBN: 080148783



Zarrilli, Phillip

Kathakali Dance-Drama. New York: Routledge, 1999. ISBN: 041519282X

ADDITIONAL BIBLIOGRAPHY

The following list is partial and does not include the many titles already on reserve or on the syllabus. If, in your study, you read something you think I should include let me know.

Performance Theory

Huizinga, Johannes. Homo Ludens: A Study of Play. London: Routledge, 2000.

MacAloon, John J. Rite, drama, festival, spectacle : rehearsals toward a theory of cultural performance. Philadelphia : Institute for the Study of Human Issues, 1984.

Roach, Joseph. Cities of the Dead: Circumatlantic Performance. New YOrk: Columbia U. Press, l996.

Schechner, Richard. Between Theater and Anthropology. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, l985.

Taylor, Diana. The Archive and the Repertoire. Duke University Press, 2003.

Turner, Victor. From Ritual to Theatre: The Human Seriousness of Play. New York: PAJ Press, l982.

Egypt and Performance
 List to be developed.  

Greek Theatre and How we Come to Know It


Alexiou, Margaret, et al. The ritual lament in Greek tradition. Rowman & Littlefield, 2002.
      On the possibility of the roots of tragedy in the poetics of lament and collective practice.

Andújar, Rosa. “Revolutionizing Greek Tragedy in Cuba: Virgilio Piñera's Electra Garrigó.” The Oxford Handbook of Greek Drama in the Americas, Oxford Handbooks Online, 2015.
      Rosa Andújar is a scholar who works on classical reception in Cuba.

Boegehold, Alan L. When a gesture was expected: a selection of examples from archaic and classical Greek literature. Princeton University Press, 1999.
      On gesture & its recoverability, and where gesture may have been indicated in scripts and text.

Cole, Susan Letzler. The absent one: mourning ritual, tragedy, and the performance of ambivalence. Pennsylvania State University Press, 1991.
 More on mourning and its relationship to tragedy as ritualized ambivalence.

Csapo, Eric. Actors and Icons of the Ancient Theater. Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell. 2010.
      On vase paintings as possible documentary evidence for Greek theatre.

Foster, Clare. “Whose Theatre is it Anyway? Ancient Chorality versus Modern Drama”
      Clare Foster studies when Greek tragedies came ‘back on the scene’ as plays and not texts.

Hall, Edith, et al. Dionysus since 69: Greek tragedy at the dawn of the third millennium. Oxford University Press, 2007.
A collection of essays reflecting on Greek tragedy in the late 20^th century (title refers to Richard Schechner’s play Dionysus in 69).
Hardwick, Lorna. Classics in post-Colonial worlds. Oxford University Press, 2010.
See esp: Ch 18, “The Empire Never Ended.” By Ika Willis p 329-348.
Ch 15, “From the Peloponnesian War to the Iraq War: A Post-Liberal Reading of   Greek Tragedy.” By Michiel Leezenberg

John J. Winkler and Froma I. Zeitlin (edd.), Nothing to Do with Dionysos? Athenian Drama in its Social Context. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990.
       See esp: The Theatre of the Polis by Oddone Longo, pp 12-19.

Vasunia, Phiroze. Empire without End: Postcolonialism and the Ancient World. I B Taurus, 2013.
      On classics as the touchstone of imperialism and colonialism.

Vasunia, Phiroze. The gift of the Nile: Hellenizing Egypt from Aeschylus to Alexander. University of California Press, 2001.
      On how the Greeks received Egyptian culture and used it to inform their national         imagination.


A few notable adaptations/translations that some of these works touch on….

Odale’s Choice (1967), Kamau Braithwaite
An adaptation of Antigone intended for school children to perform, written to enact the birth of Ghana as a nation

Flikorna (“The Girls,” 1968), Mai Zetterling
                  Feminist film, adaptation of Lysistrata

Dionysus in 69 (1970), Richard Schechner/The Performance Group
                  Adaptation of Bacchae. Environmental theatre. Everyone is naked. Viewable on youtube.

The Bacchae of Euripides: A communion Rite (1973), Wole Soyinka
                  Translation by Soyinka of Bacchae, ‘alternate’ ending from Euripides

Omeros (1990), Derek Walcott
                  Epic poem


General Greek and Roman Theatre

Beacham, Richard. The Roman Theatre and its Audience. Harvard University Press, 1996.

Beard, Mary. The Roman Triumph. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2007.

Bergman, Bettinam and Christine Kondoleon, eds. The Art of Ancient Spectacle. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1999

Bobrick, Elizabeth, "The Tyranny of Roles: Privilege in Aristophanes' Thesmophoriazusae." In The City as Comedy: Society and Representation in Athenian Drama. University of NOrth Carolina Press, 1998.

Csapo, Eric and William Slater. The Context of Ancient Drama. University of Michigan Press, l995.

Csapo, Eric, and Margaret Miller. The Origins of Theater in Ancient Greece and Beyond: From Ritual to Drama. Cambridge University Press, 2007.

Duncan, Anne. Performance and Identity in the Classical World. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006

Easterling, Pat, and Edith Hall, eds. Greek and Roman Actors: Aspects of an Ancient Profession. Cambridge University Press, 2002.

Eckart Kohne and Cornelia Ewigleben, eds., The Power of Spectacle in Ancient Rome: Gladiators and Caesars. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000.

Futrell, Allison. Blood in the Arena : The Spectacle of Roman Power. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1997

Hall, Edith. The Theatrical Cast of Athens: Interactions between Ancient Greek Drama and Society. Oxford University Press, 2006.

Mannix, Daniel P. Those About to Die: The Way of the Gladiator. New York : ibooks ; London : Simon & Schuster, 2001.

Landels, John G., Music in Ancient Greece and Rome. London: Routledge, 1999

Marshall, C.W. The Stagecraft and Performance of Roman Comedy. Cambridge University Press, 2006.

Plass, Paul. The Game of Death in Ancient Rome. Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press, 1995.

Potter, D.S. and D.J. Mattingly. Life, Death, and Entertainment in the Roman Empire. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1999.

Scodel, Ruth. Theater and Society in the Classical World. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, 1993

Silk, M. S. Aristophanes and the Definition of Comedy. Oxford University Press. 2002.

Slater,Niall W. Spectator Politics: Metatheatre and Performance in Aristophanes. University of Pennsylvania Press.

Slater, Niall W. Plautus in Performance. Routledge, 2000.

Smith, Tyler Jo. Komast Dancers in Ancient Greek Art. Oxford, 2010.

Wiles, David. Mask and Performance in Greek Tragedy. Cambridge, University Press, 2007.

Wiles, David. Tragedy in Athens: Performance Space and Theatrical Meaning. Cambridge University Press, 1999.

Winkler, John and Froma Zeitlin. Nothing to Do with Dionysos? Athenian Drama in Its Social Context. PRinceton University Press, l992.

Wise, Jennifer. Dionysus Writes: The Invention of Theatre in Ancient Greece. Ithaca NY: Cornell University Press, 2000.


Ancient Indian Theatre

Gupta, Bharat. Dramatic Concepts, Greek and Indian: A Study of the Poetics and the Natyasatra. D.K. Printworld, 2006. ISBN-10: 8124600252

Ley, Graham. "Aristotle's Poetics, Bharatamuni's Natyasastra, and Zeami's Treatises: Theory as Discourse." Asian Theatre Journal - Volume 17, Number 2, Fall 2000, pp. 191-214

Mankada, Dolararaya Ram. Ancient Indian Theatre (an interpretation of Bharata's second Adhyaya). Anand: Charotar Book Stall, 1960.

Panchal, Govardhan. Theatres of Bharata and Some Aspects of Sanskrit Play-Production. Munshiram, 1996. ISBN-10: 8121506611

Sullivan, Bruce M. "Dying on the Stage in the Nāṭyaśāstra and Kūṭiyāṭṭam: Perspectives from the Sanskrit Theatre Tradition." Asian Theatre Journal - Volume 24, Number 2, Fall 2007, pp. 422-439

Tarlekar, G.H. Studies in the Natyasastra: With Special Reference to the Sanskrit Drama in Performance. Delhi : Motilal Banarsidass, 1999.

Varadpande, Manohar Laxman. History of Indian Theatre. New Delhi : Abhinav Publications, 1987.

Pre-Colonial African Traditions

Apter, Andrew H. Black Critics & Kings : The Hermeneutics of Power in Yoruba Society. Chicago : University of Chicago Press, 1992.

Arnoldi, Mary Jo. Playing with Time : Art and Performance in Central Mali. Bloomington : Indiana University Press, 1995.

Banham, Martin, ed. History of Theatre in Africa. [electronic resource]. Cambridge ; New York : Cambridge University Press, 2004.

Harding, Frances, ed. The Performance Arts in Africa. London ; New York : Routledge, 2002.

Harrison, Paul Carter, et al, eds. Black Theatre : Ritual Performance in the African Diaspora. Philadelphia : Temple University Press, 2002.

Kramer, Fritz. The Red Fez : Art and Spirit Possession in Africa, translated by Malcolm Green. New York: Verso, 1993.

Losambe, Lokangaka, and Devi Sarinjeive. Pre-Colonial and Post-Colonial Drama and Theatre in Africa.Trenton, NJ : Africa World Press, 2001.

Medieval European Theatre

Ault, Thomas. "The Passion of Christ and Ritual Performances in Fifteenth Century Ferrara." Baylor Journal of Theatre and Performance V.3, No.2, 2006.

Chemers, Michael M. “Anti-Semitism, Surrogacy, and the Invocation of Mohammed in the Play of the Sacrament.” Comparative Drama 41:1 (Spring 2007), pp. 25-55

Clark, Robert A, and Claire Sponsler. “Other Bodies: Racial Cross-Dressing in the Mystere de la Sainte Hostie and the Croxton Play of the Sacrament.” Journal of Medieval and Early Modern Studies 29.1 (Winter 1999): 61-88.

Dox, Donnalee. The Idea of the Theater in Latin Christian Thought: Augustine to the Fourteenth Century. Ann Arbor : University of Michigan Press, c2004.

Enders, Jody. Death by Drama and Other Medieval Urban Legends. Chicago : University of Chicago Press, 2002.

Enders, Jody. “Theater makes history: Ritual murder by proxy in the Mistere de la Sainte Hostie,” Speculum 79:4, 2004, 991-1016.

Hanawalt, Barbara A., and Michal Kobialka, eds., Medieval Practices of Space, Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2000, 167-197

Kobialka, Michal. "Holy Space and Representational Place in the Tenth Century." In Levy, Shimon, ed. Theatre and Holy Script. Sussex Academic Press, 1999

Senelick, Laurence. "Skirting Christ" in The Changing Room: Sex, Drag and Theatre (Routledge, 2000).

Southern, Richard. The Medieval Theatre in the Round; A Study of the Staging of The Castle of Perseverance. London, Faber and Faber, l975.


Other Theatres of the Ancient/Medieval World

Gillam, Robin. Performance and Drama in Ancient Egypt. Publisher: Duckworth, 2006.
ISBN-10: 0715634046

Moreh, Shmuel. Live Theatre and Dramatic Literature in the Medieval Arab World. New York : New York University Press, 1992