Western Theatre in Global Contexts: Directing and Teaching Culturally Inclusive Drama Around the World ed. by Jillian Campana and Yasmine Marie Jahanmir

Abstract

Reviewed by: Western Theatre in Global Contexts: Directing and Teaching Culturally Inclusive Drama Around the World ed. by Jillian Campana and Yasmine Marie Jahanmir Peter Zazzali Western Theatre in Global Contexts: Directing and Teaching Culturally Inclusive Drama Around the World. Edited by Jillian Campana and Yasmine Marie Jahanmir. New York: Routledge, 2020; pp. 288. In reading Western Theatre in Global Contexts, I could not help but wish that the anthology was released before 2019, when I arrived in Singapore to head an acting program. As someone who identifies as a white male coming from a colonialist country, I could have used such a resource in negotiating the cross-cultural pedagogy of an arts university located in the heart of Southeast Asia. Coedited by Jillian Campana and Yasmine Marie Jahanmir, this book provides a wide range of case studies and firsthand experiences of those who have taught and/or created work in countries other than their own. It offers insights and practices that arc toward an equitable and inclusive approach to teaching and directing in that the contributors "[explore] the junctures, tensions, and discoveries" of using "English-language" texts and Western approaches in non-Western learning environments (i). Western Theatre in Global Contexts consists of four sections comprising sixteen chapters, each organized by a theme that sensibly frames their contents. Part 1, "Global Flows: Western Theatre in International Contexts," opens with the editors introducing the volume and presenting its argument to "undo assumptions" of the "universality of Western work," while "promoting the idea that any theatrical activity" must account for the cultural differences between Western and non-Western participants be they students, colleagues, or audience members (9, 11). In doing so, the book guides researchers and practitioners to explore the nuance and complexity of hybridized exchanges such as those documented throughout it. Part 2 is titled "International Stages: Western Theatre in Performance" and focuses on staging "canonical shows" in cities like Cairo and Kolkata toward rather vaguely advocating an ethical negotiation of Western/Asian identity. Parts 3 and 4 are labeled "Pedagogy Abroad: Western Theatre in Education" and "Intercultural Exchanges: Theory and Practice." The former looks at teaching strategies to mediate Western-based practices in multinational learning environments (14). The section's overarching argument is for instructors to have a humble sense of their own biases while contextualizing cultural, national, personal, and historical perspectives through affirming exchanges with students. The anthology's fourth and final part presents case studies that range from a school tour of Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra in South Africa to a dramaturgical analysis of Malagasy playwright Jean-Luc Raharimanana's Le Prophète et le Président. Each chapter attempts to address "theatrical hybridization" toward achieving the lofty, and unrealized, goal of "transforming our understandings of Western theory and practice" when working in global settings (ibid.). The authors predominantly come from Western backgrounds, although their professional affiliations and identities vary. The book's methodology is largely ethnographic and comprised of case studies that extend from teaching devised performance in Chile to an Australian/ Jordanian collaboration on a shadow play. Each chapter involves a different geographical and institutional locus, with a plurality of African and Asian countries providing the backdrop for intersectional instruction at secondary schools and conservatoires as well as large universities and cultural centers. Indeed, one of the anthology's appealing features is the distinctiveness of its examples. Every participant and their project tellingly if not definitively serve the book's aim to negotiate Western texts and pedagogies in non-Western learning environments. Editors Campana and Jahanmir coalesce the volume's disparate offerings through implicit and explicit advisories. At the center of this ethos is the belief that anyone teaching or directing in a foreign country should account for the indigeneity of their host institution and its students. The editors' coauthored conclusion explains some best practices for doing so, whereby strategies from "privileging the voices of participants" and "acknowledging biases and assumptions" elide with active and empathic listening and putting matters into context (254–55). Predictably, some of the chapters demonstrate these practices better than others. Mark Tardi and Lynne Kent's contributions center the identities of their Omani and Jordanian students, respectively, while arriving...