300836 Performing Protest/Performing Power: Practice as Research In Gender Studies and Performance (S) (WiSe 2020/2021)

What is the relationship between the performances of Beyoncé, Jesse Owens, and Thích Quảng Đứ?... Protest! Each of these cultural figures put their bodies on the line, by using protest as performance to challenge power structures, address social equity, and influence social change. Case Studies may include how: How the Klu Klux Klan and the Westboro Baptist Church use protest strategies and religious iconography to terrorize marginalized groups; Jesse Owens’s silent and reverent raised fist at the 1968 Olympics; Beyoncé’s halftime Superbowl performance of her song ‘Formation’ referencing Activism and the Black Panthers. Throughout the class students will be asked to place themselves in a historical continuum where intersections of class, race, gender, and sexuality are considered. Class assignments will include, but are not limited to the well-framed selfie, YouTube confessional videos, response papers, and pop-up performances. Religion through the performative, that is, practices over belief, will be a key theme running through the class.
Key theoretical premises:
Phenomenology (queer)
Radical Standpoint Epistemologies
Theory Generation (liberatory practices)
Practice as Research

Practical applications
This class will work through several apllied research methodologies (particpatory ehtnogrpahy, digital story telling, and embodied inquiry synthesis). This class will focus on materality and short projects. Some assignmets will be collobrative. How do we do impactful research in the time of COVID?

Please note
This seminar is offered through the International Guest Lectureship Program. Because of the coronavirus pandemic, the seminar will take place virtually in January 2021. More information will be announced soon.

Bibliography

Ahmed, Sara. Queer phenomenology: Orientations, objects, others. Duke University Press, 2006.
Schechner, Richard. "What is performance studies anyway." The ends of performance (1998): 357-362.
Parker, Andrew, and Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick. "Introduction to performativity and performance." The Performance Studies Reader (2004): 167-174.
Quashie, Kevin. The sovereignty of quiet: Beyond Resistance in Black culture. Rutgers University Press, 2012.
Crosby, Kevin, Joong-oh Rhee, and Jimmie Holland. "Suicide by fire: a contemporary method of political protest." International Journal of Social Psychiatry 23.1 (1977): 60-69.
Hondagneu-Sotelo, Pierrette, et al. "“There's a Spirit That Transcends the Border”: Faith, Ritual, and Postnational Protest at the US-Mexico Border." Sociological Perspectives47.2 (2004): 133-159.
Pellegrini, Ann. "Signaling Through the Flames": Hell House Performance and Structures of Religious Feeling." American Quarterly 59.3 (2007): 911-935.
Muñoz, José Esteban. "Ephemera as evidence: Introductory notes to queer acts." (1996): 5-16.
Turner, Victor, Roger D. Abrahams, and Alfred Harris. The ritual process: Structure and anti-structure. Routledge, 2017. (introduction)
Jones, Joni L. "Performance ethnography: The role of embodiment in cultural authenticity." Theatre Topics 12.1 (2002): 1-15.
Merleau-Ponty, Phenomenology of Perception. Routledge, 2013.