DUENDE (a collective for collaborative art and critical knowledge) and Faculty of Theatre Studies Frankfurt/M invites you to submit abstracts for a “kleines süßes” symposium/workshop on “Re-Thinking the Post-migrant Theatre: Origins – Development– Chances – Potentials”
About
The Post-migrant theater movement (PMT) could be evaluated as the off-theater movement from margins against the hegemonic/mainstream German theatre. And in this context, it could be signified as a radical theatrical/dramaturgical/aesthetic, and most importantly, political revolt against the mainstream German theater as a non-German art attack at the very beginning of the 21st century. Even though this rebellion seems suppressed, the potential that created it is still alive and powerful. The aesthetic and politic dimensions of this movement interweave resistance with cultural/collective memory. The implications of the politic dimension have resistance against oppression, especially racial and class inequalities. PMT is the theatrical struggle for memory against ignoring and a battlefield for utopias. The emergence of PMT established a new dramaturgical/representational strategy, new aesthetics and resistance politics in art. Nation-states, borders, migrations and displacements are always traumatic for people. Racialized and underclass PM Theatre-makers and artists, who developed their point of view, eventually found a voice to express their oppression and traumas, and become the agents of their own resistance narratives. Moreover, they also gave voice to the speechless and produced a positive representation of those who didn’t have one. That’s why both collective memory – which is mostly prosthetic – and traumatic experiences are crucial in PMT practices. Thus PMT attempted to tell the absent stories and new narratives of the Fourth Worlders. Moreover, PMT criticized and undermined the hegemonic and reductive discourses of the policymakers. On the other hand, PMT was also an intellectual challenge and tried to initiate a radical off-disciplinary dialogue between artists, academics and activists. The Ballhaus Naunynstraße in Berlin is the first collective platform that could initiate a solidarity movement among post-migrant artists.
More than a decade after the beginnings of the PMT and observing a continuing desire for diversification of many German theatres, we ask ourselves: How has the PMT developed? Is it still an antithesis or has it long since become institutionalized? How can PMT be understood today and what chances does it offer for the theatre and society of the future?
These and other questions we would like to discuss with leading as well as new theatre-makers and artists of the PMT and also examine their artistic practice. We want to make this meeting as manifold as possible and are therefore thinking about different formats as round table discussions, public speeches, performances, movies and music – but of course, we are also open to new suggestions.
When: May 27-29, 2021
Where : studioNAXOS Frankfurt a/M
Deadline for paper proposals: April 16, 2021
Possible topics might include, but are not limited to:
Post-migrant theater movement relations with cultural background and general trauma
• Trauma and the role of trauma in the post-migrant theater’s dramatic / aesthetic development
• Post-migrant theater as a new way to the alternative theater movement
• Dramaturgies of the state versus the Post-migrant dramaturgy
• Decolonization and Post-migrant theater movement
• Post-migrant theater movement in recent community movements
• Potential for post-migrant theater activities and future
• Post-migrant theater today
• Theatrical / political rebellion against the post-migrant theater movement
• Potential for new alternative movements in the post-migrant theater movement
• The capability of building solidarity among alternative theaters in Germany against neoliberal politics
•The forms of the encounter between the new-wave migrant artists and the residues of the Post-migrant theater
•Interactions of PMT with other movements of the “German” theater
•Contributions of exilic/migrant/community theaters (or theaters in mother language) to the alternative theater in Germany and ways of their engagement with Post-migrant theater
Details
We hereby invite applications from early career researchers and in particular from graduate students.
Abstracts should not be longer than 300 words. A short bio is also needed. Submit your abstract and bio to postmigrant@beyondallborders.eu at latest by April 16, 2021.
Please note that accepted participants need to submit an extended abstract of 600-700 words as of May 14, 2021. The extended abstracts and the bios will be uploaded to the event website before the meeting/workshop.
For questions, please contact us at postmigrant@beyondallborders.eu
The meeting is organized by Hakan Altun and Antigone Akgün, in collaboration with the Department of Theatre Studies Frankfurt/M at Goethe University.