There are many instances in scholarly writing and pop culture in which transgender identity is invoked as a metaphor for the fragmenting, decentering, and virtualizing effects of digital media and technologies, contributing to cultural tropes that imagine transgender people as u…
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This dissertation examines masculinities in relation to Pahlavi-era Iran, the Islamic Republic of Iran, within diaspora, as well as the limitations of an ethno-cultural/gender study through ideologies of postidentification. "Performing Persianicity" functions as trope and design…
Cultures are defined by their boundaries. American culture often calls this boundary "the frontier," and has built a strong mythic interpretation of this frontier. People living on this frontier behave in ways that may not be considered "civilized." Borrowing from Roach's work i…
This thesis is a socio-political analysis of the United Kingdom’s contemporary national identity, as expressed through an intercultural examination of eight Anton Chekhov’s productions presented in the country between 2009 and 2011, characterised by their aesthetic and socio-pol…
This practice-as-research project investigates pluralistic approaches to the construction of place through art-making. I propose ‘place-making’ as a theory of practice which aims to encourage artists and practitioner-researchers to challenge dominant socio-spatial configurations…
The Edinburgh International Festival (EIF) and the Adelaide Festival, and their associated Fringe Festivals, are large international multi-arts events that focus on artistic excellence and annually imbue their host cities with month-long festive atmospheres. They are also mobili…
This thesis investigates the cultural uses and implied signifying practices of the work of actors who are popularly and frequently described as 'Shakespearean.' Though ubiquitous figures within culture, there is a dearth of criticism which questions what qualities are invoked in…
Throughout Billy Graham’s career, the evangelist sought performative manners to ensure that he would not be perceived as another “Elmer Gantry”, or huckster preacher out to win money, fame, and favor. Graham’s intent was to grow a ministry that would form a new performance parad…
Eighteenth and nineteenth century anthropology and ethnography constructed the "Other" as visually spectacular, something to be interpreted and understood according to prevalent scientific theories of the time. The "Other" was voiceless and had no input in the official ethnograp…
The state uses public funeral practice and large-scale national mourning as an opportunity to affirm cultural and sexual norms as state values, as evidenced in state and military funerals. My dissertation, "Queering U.S. Public Mourning Practice: Funerals, Performance, and the C…
Each September states and their representatives converge at the United Nations to mount an annual show with a global audience. In international institutions one finds many species of theatre, but that appellation should not be taken pejoratively. Placing the work of the United N…
This dissertation explores the reconfiguration of Syriac Orthodox liturgical tradition among Aramaic-speaking Christian refugees in the Netherlands. Under the pressures of Dutch integration policy and the global politics of secular recognition, the Syriac liturgy is rapidly losi…
Since the beginning of the triangular African slave trade, many African Americans have held a fascination with Africa as demonstrated through the recirculation of the "return to Africa" meme found in their storytelling, religious practices and music. From sequestered spaces of u…
Staging the African explores how the practice, production and staged performances of West African-derived dance and the West African dancing body emerged within the context of the West African Independence and African American Liberation Movements of the 1960s. Through the revie…
“Entertaining Strangers” reveals how theories and practices of hospitality shaped and were shaped by the early modern print and theater industries. Whereas earlier studies of hospitality and literature have focused on aristocratic patronage, in this dissertation I reveal the vit…
This project interrogates anti-Black violence within the American interstate system and examines artistic and activist modes of refusal communities have deployed. I specifically meditate on everyday refusals and placemaking strategies as performances which map and [w]right—as in…
This dissertation compares and contrasts the performance works of two Indigenous transdisciplinary artists who have historically been discussed as dancers or choreographers: Yup’ik artist Emily Johnson and Seneca artist Rosy Simas. By considering their dance works alongside thei…
This thesis analyzes, for the first time, how audiences have engaged with Shakespeare in both colonial and post-colonial Punjab, a state in India. It demonstrates how Shakespeare’s cultural mobility is dependent upon how target cultures re-semniotize his plays to accommodate ele…
Seventeenth-century Venetian operatic divas pioneered a new social identity for women both onstage, as virtuosic opera singers, and as independent professionals in Venice. They accomplished this partly in prototypical commercial opera houses. From such spaces, the sounds of thei…