About
Thinking as/through Performance
The Cambridge Interdisciplinary Performance Network (CIPN) brings together people from a wide variety of different backgrounds in Cambridge and beyond to explore the idea of performance as a concept, from music and literary studies to history, anthropology, architecture and medicine. CIPN strives to foster exchange on the potential of performance to engender dialogue across conventionally separated cultural categories, practices and disciplines.
Interest in performance reflects a movement away from thinking in terms of immutable objects and singular subjects. It focuses attention instead on collective contexts. It offers an umbrella approach with which to interrogate a given phenomenon (both individual and collective). Thinking as/through performance proposes a different way to mean – a ‘kind of thinking in its own right’ (Cull/Minors 2012) – which performances, theatricality, theatre, and the arts in practice can also model.
A few questions that underpin our thinking are:
- What does it mean to frame, stage, display or enact? In what sense might all forms of self-consciously public statements – art, politics, academic discourse – be seen as performance?
- How is our post-print digital era, with its forces of equivalence and convergence, prompting reconsideration of traditional categories and boundaries – i.e. of the disciplinary itself?
- How do we understand objects (fixed, a record) when they cannot exist separately from their experience on the part of somebody or other (time-bound, embodied)?
- How do we understand the subject when it depends on imagined and actual collectivities to position itself?
Each session is flexibly organised around two short presentations from different disciplinary backgrounds, followed by extended discussion. We also regularly host workshops, performances and panel discussions in collaboration with creative practitioners. CIPN aims to provide a platform for discursive encounters that foster greater dialogue between the academy and creative practice more generally.
Annual theme 2018-19: Performance and the Body
Having programmed seminars with a slight emphasis on current debates in Theatre Studies (2013-14), Anthropology (2014-15), Art History (2015-16), English (2016-17) and Theology (2017-18), CIPN aims to open up a conversation between Classics and other academic and creative perspectives this year. How may we ‘anchor’, in the words of Ineke Sluiter, modern-day discourses of performance in a ‘framework of tradition, innovation and/or subversion’? What is the performative relevance of ideas of the classic(al) in scholarly and artistic communities in this context?
Under the umbrella theme of ‘Performance and the Body’, we will explore the idea of the performative body/embodied performances as a mode of thinking that is particularly fruitful for a diachronic enquiry into the changing meanings and significance of conceptions of the self, the person and the individual.
The following three sub-topics will frame our programme for the year:
Michaelmas Term 2018: Performance and the self: embodying identity from antiquity to today
Lent Term 2019: The body in communal performance: politics, culture, space, translation
Easter Term 2019: The (im)perfect body: the grotesque versus the ideal
For further information about CIPN and this year’s programme, please feel free to get in touch with the current seminar convenors Antonia Marie Reinke, Maria Khan, Matthew Parvin, Naomi Woo and Valerio Zanetti
To sign up to post or receive information about events relating to the concept of performance, please visit Ucam-performance-network@lists.cam.ac.uk or contact Dr Clare Foster
Administrative assistance: Networks@crassh.cam.ac.uk
Convenors
Convenors
Antonia Marie Reinke (PhD student, Classics)
Maria Khan (PhD student, MML)
Matthew Parvin (PhD student, English)
Naomi Woo (PhD student, Music)
Valerio Zanetti (PhD student, History)
Antonia Marie Reinke is a Cambridge Trust and AHRC-funded PhD candidate in Classics whose work explores the socio-hierarchical conceptualizations of the body in fifth-century Athenian drama. Beyond her immediate research, Antonia is very interested in questions of being and performance, constructions of social identity, hierarchy and mobility as well as ideas of transformation and metamorphosis.
Maria Khanis a PhD candidate at the Faculty of Modern and Medieval Languages specializing in German literature and integration of Muslim migrants within the German context. Her work explores the identity of Turkish-German secondary school students through performance-based teaching of Goethe’s Faust. Maria has a decade long experience of acting and directing stage plays, including having performed at the Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre in London.
Matthew Parvin is a PhD candidate in English at Cambridge. He is writing on the work of Caryl Churchill, exploring the development of her craft and considering how she writes about economic systems. Matthew is also a published playwright, and his work has been performed at theatres across the UK.
Naomi Woo is a pianist, conductor, and researcher, currently pursuing a PhD in musicology at Clare College as a Gates Cambridge scholar. Naomi also holds a BA in mathematics & philosophy from Yale University, and degrees in piano performance from the Yale School of Music and Université de Montréal. With Sasha Amaya, she directs tick tock, a collaboration for sonic and choreographic performance.
Valerio Zanetti is a Cambridge Trust and AHRC-funded History PhD candidate at St. John’s College, where his thesis investigates the emergence of female sport in early modern Europe. More generally, Valerio’s research explores embodied experiences of early modern people in connection with changes in conceptions of the gendered body. He is also interested in the study of fashion as embodied practice
Faculty Advisors
Dr Renaud Gagné (Faculty of Classics)
Dr Clare Foster (CRASSH)
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Previous Convenors
Rachel Stroud (Faculty of Music) [2014-18]
Rozelle Bosch (Faculty of Divinity) [2016-18]
Dr Clare Foster (BA PDF, CRASSH) [2013-16, 2017-18]
Michael Byrne(CMPCP, Dance) [2014-16]
Jack Belloli (Faculty of English) [2016-17]
Yesim Yaprak Yildiz (Departmemnt of Sociology) [2016-17]
Rin Ushiyama (Department of Sociology) [2015-16]
Neylan Bagcioglu (History of Art) [2015-16]
Dr Jonas Tinius (Division of Social Anthropology) [2013-16]
Previous Faculty Advisors
Dr Zoe Svendsen (Lecturer in Drama, Faculty of English)
Professor John Rink (Professor of Musical Performance Studies, Faculty of Music)
Dr Santinder Gill (Centre for Music and Science, Faculty of Music)
Prof Catherine Pickstock (Reader in Philosophy and Theology, Faculty of Divinity)
Professor Andrew Webber (Professor of Modern German and Comparative Culture, Faculty of Modern and Medieval Languages)
Dr Luke Skrebowski (History of Art)
Dr Alyce Mahon (History of Art
Dr Lucia Ruprecht (Faculty of Modern and Medieval Languages)
Dr Michael Hrebeniak (Faculty of English)
Professor Robin Kirkpatrick (Faculty of Modern and Medieval Languages)
Dr Joel Chalfen (Lecturer in Drama, Faculty of Education)
Professor John Robb (Professor of European Prehistory, Department of Archaeology)
Dr Marcus Morgan (Postdoctoral Research Associate, Department of Sociology)
Programme 2018-19
| Performance network |
|---|
| The Politics of Laughter 02 October 2018, Judith E. Wilson Studio, Faculty of English, 9 West Road *NB Different room today* Stuart Grant (Monash University), Betsy Salkind (Actress, Comedian, Writer) - Performance Network (CIPN) |
| The Medicalization of the Female Body 18 October 2018, Seminar Room SG1, Alison Richard Building, 7 West Road *NB Different day* Emerita Helen King (Open University), Lucy van de Wiel (Cambridge), Zeynep Gürtin (ULC), Leah Astbury (Huntington Library) - Performance Network (CIPN) |
| Heracles’ Body – An Unexpected Site of Gender Contest? 30 October 2018, Seminar Room SG1, Alison Richard Building, 7 West Road Chiara Blanco (Cambridge), Broderick Chow (Brunel, London) - Performance Network (CIPN) |
| Looking again at the Gendered Self: From Performance to Representation 13 November 2018, Seminar Room SG1, Alison Richard Building, 7 West Road Anne Duncan (Nebraska), Clare Foster (BAPF, CRASSH) - Performance Network (CIPN) |
| Dressing the Self/Other in Greek Drama, Italian Opera and Rural Albania 27 November 2018, Seminar Room SG1, Alison Richard Building, 7 West Road NB Start 5.30pm Rosie Wyles (Kent), Matteo Augello (London College of Fashion), Ellen Robertson Martinez (Cambridge) - Performance Network (CIPN) |
| The Body as a Political and Religious Entity 17 January 2019, Judith E. Wilson Studio, Faculty of English, 9 West Road *NB Different room and day* Justine McConnell ( KCL), Atiya Khan (Pakistani Film Maker) - Performance Network (CIPN) |
| Performing Muslim Identity 29 January 2019, Seminar Room SG2, Alison Richard Building, 7 West Road *NB Different time room today Maria Kahn (Cambridge), Amena Amer (LSE) - Performance Network (CIPN) |
| Identity and Corporeal Performance in Space 12 February 2019, Seminar Room SG1, Alison Richard Building, 7 West Road Tatjana Crossley (London), Adriana Cobo (Central Saint Martins), Karenjit Clare (Cambridge), Mary Freedman (Belfast), Natalie Morningstar (Cambridge) - Performance Network (CIPN) |
| Translation as Performance 23 February 2019, Room G21, Faculty of Classics, Sidgwick Avenue. NB Different venue Caroline Vout, Caroline van Eck, Peter McMurray, Rebecca Lämmle, Renaud Gagné, Robin Osborne, Simon Goldhill, Sam Barrett, Sean Curran (Cambridge), Erika Fischer-Lichte (Berlin), Martin Revermann (Toronto), Ross Parry (Leicester) - Joint event Re-Interdisciplinary and Performance Network (CIPN) |
| Restaging the Chorus - The Case of David Greig 12 March 2019, Seminar Room SG1, Alison Richard Building, 7 West Road Lucy Jackson (KCL), Polina Kalinina (Theatre Director), Veronica Rodriguez (Barcelona) - Performance Network (CIPN) |
| The Body as Machine 30 April 2019, Different date and venue: Judith E. Wilson Drama Studio, Faculty of English, 9 West Road, Cambridge, CB3 9DP Maria Gerolemou (Exeter), Einav Katan-Schmid (Berlin), David Trippett (Cambridge) |
| CANCELLED: Fragmented Bodies: Articulating Social Gaps and Physical Pain 07 May 2019, Seminar Room SG1, Alison Richard Building, 7 West Road, Cambridge, CB3 9DT Hande Güzel (Cambridge), Daniel King (Exeter) |
| How Does Canon Shape Culture? The Role of Canonization in the Performance of Contemporary Identities 14 May 2019, Different date and room: Seminar Room S1, First Floor, Alison Richard Building, 7 West Road, Cambridge, CB3 9DT Margaret Litvin (Boston) |
| Grotesque(ing) Bodies 04 June 2019, Seminar Room SG1, Alison Richard Building, 7 West Road, Cambridge, CB3 9DT Nancy Worman (Columbia), Karen Throsby (Leeds), Marina Galetaki (Bristol) |
Past events
| Performance network |
|---|
| Performance and Cognition 21 October 2013, CRASSH, Seminar room SG1, Ground floor Peter Meineck (NY), Roger Kneebone (London) with demostrations by Hadas Selbst (London/USA), Chair: Vladimir Mirodan at Performance Network |
| Objections to Objects: Live Art and Music 04 November 2013, CRASSH, Seminar room SG1, Ground floor Clare Foster (Cambridge), Daniel Leech-Wilkinson (KCL), John Rink (Cambridge) at Performance Network |
| The Work of the Audience 18 November 2013, CRASSH, Seminar room SG1, Ground floor Nicholas Ridout (London), Steven Connor (Cambridge) Chair: Zoë Svendsen (Cambridge) at Performance Network |
| Fourth Walls 02 December 2013, CRASSH, Seminar room SG1, Ground floor Kate Newey (Exeter), Karen Jürs-Munby (Lancaster) Chair: Clare Foster (Cambridge) With: Actress Janie Dee (2 Oliver Awards), at Performance Network |
| Performing Cities 27 January 2014, CRASSH Seminar room SG1, Ground floor Mehrdad Seyf and 30 Bird, Helen Stratford, Michael Hrebeniak and David Grundy (Cambridge) at Performance Network |
| Dance as Ethnography 10 February 2014, CRASSH Seminar room SG1, Ground floor Kate Elswit (Bristol), Lucia Ruprecht (Cambridge), Daniel Siekhaus (Cambridge) at Performance Network |
| Improvisation: Live versus Record 24 February 2014, CRASSH Seminar room SG1, Ground floor Simon Jones (Bristol), Floris Schuiling (Cambridge), Luke Skrebowski (Cambridge) at Performance Network |
| Praxis and Practice: Science as Art 10 March 2014, CRASSH Seminar room SG1, Ground floor Charlotte Tulinius (Copenhagen),Paul McIntosh (QMUL), Olivia Winteringham (Kindle Theatre), Claire Summerfield (Independent Creative Producer) at Performance N. |
| Movements between Art and Anthropology 28 April 2014, CRASSH Seminar room SG1 Khadija von Zinnenburg Carroll (Berlin/Cambridge), Adrien Sina (London), Michael Murawski (Cambridge), Nikolai Ssorin-Chaikov (Cambridge) at Performance. Joint event with Field Note Research Group. |
| Performance and its Objects: From Collective to Collection 19 May 2014, CRASSH Seminar room SG1 Alan Read, Georgina Guy (KCL), Ellie Lavan (Cambridge) at Performance Network |
| Performance Philosophy 02 June 2014, CRASSH Seminar room SG1 Laura Cull (Surrey), Eirini Kartsaki (Anglia Ruskin) at Performance Network |
| Performing the Public Sphere 13 October 2014, Room SG2, Alison Richard Building Anastasia Piliavsky (Cambridge/UCL), Rafael Schacter (BA Postdoctoral Fellow) at Performance |
| Creativity and Capitalism: Opponents or Allies? 27 October 2014, Room SG1, Alison Richard Building Eleonora Belfiore (Warwick), Susan Bayly and Jonas Tinius (Cambridge) at Performance |
| Rehearsal: Performing the Everyday 10 November 2014, Room SG1, Alison Richard Building Rachel Davies (Kingston), Tracy Davis (Northwestern), Clare Foster (Cambridge) at Performance |
| Homo Ludens: Parties, Participation, and Play 24 November 2014, Room SG1, Alison Richard Building Renaud Gagné, Sir Patrick Bateson, Anthony Pickles (Cambridge) at Performance |
| Making a Scene! (Symposium) 12 January 2015, King‘s College, Wine Room (NB Different venue*) A 0ne-Day Simposium - Performance CIPN |
| Performing Laboratories Workshop (Joint event) 19 January 2015, Room SG1, Alison Richard Building Joint event with Civic Matter -Performance |
| Institutions and the Avant-Garde 02 February 2015, Room SG1, Alison Richard Building Gigi Argyropoulou (Birkbeck), Georgina Born (Oxford), Pascal Gielen (Groningen), Jonas Tinius (Cambridge) - Performance CIPN |
| Truth and Reconciliation Performed 16 February 2015, Room SG1, Alison Richard Building Ananda Breed (London), Andrea Grant, Timothy Jenkins, Ariana Philips (Cambridge) -Performance CIPN |
| The Drama of Ideas: Performing Intellectuals 02 March 2015, Room SG1, Alison Richard Building Patrick Baert, Marcus Morgan, Jonas Tinius and Floris Schuiling (Cambridge) -Performance CIPN |
| Free for All Symposium (Concept of Performance) 23 April 2015, Room SG1, Alison Richard Building Performance Network CIPN |
| What do images do? Picturing Africa and Islam 27 April 2015, Room SG1, Alison Richard Building Massimilano Fusari (SOAS), Christos Lynteris and Branwyn Poleykett (Visual Plague, CRASSH) — Performance CIPN |
| Theatricality 11 May 2015, Room SG1, Alison Richard Building Clare Foster (UCL), Sophie Nield (RHUL) — Performance CIPN |
| POSTPONED: Framing the Future: The impact of the digital era 26 May 2015, Room SG1, Alison Richard Building. NB Different day and time* Sheila Hayman (Film maker) —Performance CIPN |
| How art performs society 04 June 2015, Room SG1 & SG2, Alison Richard Building Roger Sansi (Goldsmiths), Dame Marilyn Strathern (Cambridge) — Performance CIPN |
| Theatre, Philosophy, Pedagogy / Martin Puchner 05 October 2015, Seminar Room SG1, Alison Richard Building Special event with Martin Puchner (Harvard) -Performance Network/CIPN |
| Imagining the Digital Future: A Social Revolution? 12 October 2015, Seminar Room SG1, Alison Richard Building John Naughton (CRASSH), Sheila Hayman (Filmmaker BAFTA award-winning)- Performance Network/CIPN |
| Text and Scores as Spaces of Interaction 26 October 2015, Seminar Room SG2, Alison Richard Building *NB Different room* Margaret Faultless (Cambridge,Royal Academy of Music), Margherita Laera (Kent)-Performance Network/CIPN |
| Can Performance Teach us about History and Historical Time? 09 November 2015, Seminar Room SG1, Alison Richard Building Sanja Perovic (KCL), Stuart Brisley (Artist)-Performance Network/CIPN |
| What’s in a Frame: Art Interacting with Life 23 November 2015, Seminar Room SG1, Alison Richard Building Victoria Miguel (Writer/Curator), Daniel Brine(The Cambridge Juction)-Performance Network/CIPN |
| Performing Knowledge: The Mediating Body 18 January 2016, Seminar Room SG1, Alison Richard Building Satinder P. Gill (CMS,Cambridge), Michael Byrne (CMPCP, Cambridge)-CIPN |
| Archival Performativity 01 February 2016, Seminar Room SG1, Alison Richard Building Joanna Melvin (Chelsea), Luke Skrebowski (Cambridge)- CIPN |
| Performance and Subversion in Public Spaces 15 February 2016, Seminar Room SG1, Alison Richard Building Dave Beech (Gothenburg), Chloë Alaghband-Zadeh (Cambridge) -CIPN |
| Agency and Performance: Objects and the Social 29 February 2016, Seminar Room SG1, Alison Richard Building Rachel Stroud (Music, Cambridge), John Robb (Archaeology, Cambridge)-CIPN |
| On Detachment and Relations 25 April 2016, Seminar Room SG1, Alison Richard Building Hallvard Lillehammer (Birkbeck), Matei Candea (Cambridge)-Performance Network-CIPN |
| Politics, Memory and Performance 09 May 2016, Seminar Room SG1, Alison Richard Building Paul Connerton (Cambridge), Mischa Twitchin (QMU, London)- Performance Network-CIPN |
| Training in Theory 23 May 2016, Seminar Room SG1, Alison Richard Building Tom Cornford (Central School of Speech and Drama), David Winters (Cambridge)-Performance Network-CIPN |
| Staging radical disobedience: Antigone's revolt, from Brecht to the 1960s and beyond 06 June 2016, Alison Richard Building: Seminar room SG2 1:00pm and SG1 from 5:00pm Half day Workshop. Registration required- CIPN |
| Shakespeare: Translating, Adapting, Inhabiting 10 October 2016, Seminar Room SG1, Alison Richard Building Simon Palfrey (Oxford), Enza De Francisci (UCL)- at Performance Network (CIPN) |
| Performance and Wellbeing 24 October 2016, Seminar Room SG1, Alison Richard Building Amanda Kelleher (Professional Clown), Jane Rich (Cambridge Community Arts), John Harper (Founder of Rize)– at Performance Network (CIPN) |
| Performing Cities 07 November 2016, Seminar Room SG1, Alison Richard Building Lizzie Richardson (Durham), Michael Hrebeniak (Cambridge)- at Performance Network (CIPN) |
| Landscape, Dwelling and Site-Specific Practice 21 November 2016, Seminar Room SG1, Alison Richard Building Stephen Bottoms (Manchester), Yvonne Salmon (Cambridge) - Joint event Performance Network (CIPN) and Alchemical Landscape |
| Identities in Popular Performance 23 January 2017, Seminar room SG1, Alison Richard Building Ross Cole (Cambridge), Broderick Chow (Brunel, London)- at Performance Network (CIPN) |
| Performing the Passion: Women Religious and Creative acts of Prayer 06 February 2017, Seminar room SG1, Alison Richard Building Ayla Lepine (Essex), Heather Webb (Cambridge) -at Performance Network (CIPN) |
| The Late Walter Benjamin 20 February 2017, Drama Studio, Faculty of English (NB Different venue) John Schad (Lancaster), Fred Dalmasso (Loughborough)- at Performance Network (CIPN) |
| Doing Justice: Trials, Performance, Law 06 March 2017, Seminar room SG1, Alison Richard Building Başak Ertür (Birkbeck College), Mayur Suresh (SOAS)-at Performance Network (CIPN) |
| Serge Lifar and the Interwar Dance Discourses of Neoclassicism 1930-39 13 March 2017, Seminar room SG1, Alison Richard Building Mark Franko (Temple University, Boyer College of Music and Dance), Lucia Ruprecht (Cambridge)-at Performance Network (CIPN) |
| Michel Foucault's Confessions of the Flesh and the... 02 May 2017, Seminar Room SG2, Alison Richard Building. NB Different date Ulrike Auga (Berlin) at the Cambridge Interdisciplinary Performance Network (CIPN) |
| Left Unsettled: The Politics of left-wing Militants' Confessions to Past Violence 15 May 2017, Seminar Room SG1, Alison Richard Building Leigh Payne (Oxford), Paloma Aguilar (UNED) at Cambridge Interdisciplinary Performance Network (CIPN) |
| Encore? A Future for Performance Studies 12 June 2017, Seminar Room SG1, Alison Richard Building Roundtable at the Cambridge Interdisciplinary Performance Network (CIPN) |
| Is God a Guy and are Angels Girls? 10 October 2017, Seminar Room SG1, Alison Richard Buildng Andrew Hammond, Ankur Barua, Rebecca Lees, Robin Osborne (Cambridge)Ayla Lepine (Essex), Peterson Feital (KCL) - Performance CIPN |
| 19th C. Peep-shows Reimagined in the Digital Age 24 October 2017, Seminar Room SG1, Alison Richard Buildng Tony Lidington (Arts Evangelist/ Exeter) - Performance CIPN |
| Eastern Harmonies and Western Spaces 07 November 2017, Seminar Room SG1, Alison Richard Buildng Odissi Ensemble (Workshop) - Performance CIPN |
| The Gendered Lectern: Performing Authority 21 November 2017, Seminar Room SG1, Alison Richard Buildng Sarah Coakley, VictorIa Bateman (Cambridge), Carmen-Helena Telltez (Notre Dame), Ms Naz Yeni (Theatre Director) - Performance CIPN |
| Narratives and Artificial Intelligence 23 January 2018, Seminar room SG1, Alison Richard Building Stephen Cave, Beth Singler, Sarah Dillon, Kanta Dihal (CFI) - Performance CIPN |
| RASHDASH 06 February 2018, Seminar room SG1, Alison Richard Building Helen Goalen, Abbi Greenland (RASHDASH) - Performance CIPN |
| POSTPONED: Mitre or Mao Cap: Archbishop Desmond Tutu as Performer – a Prescient Activism? 27 February 2018, Seminar room SG1, Alison Richard Building John Allen (Communication Director South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commission), Louise Blythe (BBC) - Performance CIPN |
| Postponed (15 May): Bach and Bodies 06 March 2018, Seminar room SG1, Alison Richard Building Jamie Hawkey (Cambridge), Margaret Faultless (Cambridge), Bettina Varwig (KCL) - Performance CIPN |
| Mitre or Mao Cap: Archbishop Desmond Tutu as Performer – a Prescient Activism? 04 April 2018, Seminar room SG2, Alison Richard Building. John Allen (Communication Director South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commission), Louise Blythe (BBC) - Performance CIPN |
| A Certain Sense of Order 29 April 2018, Judith E Wilson Drama Studio, English Faculty, 9 West Road. 1-2pm Optional workshop Tick Tock group - Performance CIPN |
| Bach and Bodies 15 May 2018, Seminar room SG1, Alison Richard Building Jamie Hawkey (Cambridge), Margaret Faultless (Cambridge), Bettina Varwig (KCL), Bill Hunt - Performance CIPN |
| Masks, Face, Performance Identity in the Theatre of Surgery 17 May 2018, Seminar room SG1, Alison Richard Building Femi Oyebode (Birmingham), Jan Parker (Cambridge), Emma Barnard (Artist) - Performance CIPN |
| Made in the Image of Man: Refracted Bodies 29 May 2018, Seminar room SG1, Alison Richard Building Ola Sigurdson (Gothenburg), David Trippett (Cambridge) - Performance CIPN |
| Creative Futures and Being in Between: Prof Victoria Vesna 12 June 2018, Seminar room SG1, Alison Richard Building Victoria Vesna (UCLA and North American editor of the AI and Society Journal) - Performance CIPN |
Past Conferences
16 April 2013: Beyond the authority of the ‘text’: performance as paradigm, past and present
8 December 2014: The Politics of Framing and Staging: Performance as Paradigm II
23 April 2015: Free for All Symposium (Concept of Performance)