Call for Abstracts – ATHE 2018 –Panel Proposal

AMERICA ONLINE: (WEB)SITE-SPECIFIC PERFORMANCE

A potential Multidisciplinary Panel for

Performance Studies Focus Group and American Theatre and Drama Society

In 2012, Forbes Magazine published an article titled “The Internet Revolution is the New Industrial Revolution.” When “ARPANet” moved from a government application to a public one in the 1990s, the world shook. Since then, globalization, connectedness, and a slew of new sociological trends have emerged. According to this article, “[i]t’s a sweeping social disruption that brings with it not only new inventions and scientific advances, but perhaps most importantly revolutionizes both the methods of work and we the workers ourselves.”[1] But we have known this for a while. The “heyday” of the Internet Revolution been left in the dust, with this five-year old magazine article just one in a pile of billions. The “heyday” has become the everyday. However, in the context of theatre, the Internet Age is still brand new, a relative blip on the 2500-year radar of our history. Theatres across the world are still attempting to discern how best to use the Twentieth Century’s greatest gift to their advantage. Performance Studies has dug into the depths of digital performativity, but there is still a whole lot to mine.  

This panel will address Online performance, both theatrical and social. This panel will also solely address American-based Internet performances, yet how you choose to frame “American” is up to you. The performance(s) you wish to discuss needs to have either been entirely performed Online, or at least a significant portion. Potential topics include:

• Populist Internet Movements (Black Lives Matter, #MAGA, etc.)
• Massively Multiplayer Online (MMO) Gaming (World of Warcraft, Destiny, etc.)
• Experimental/Experiential Commercial Theatre Marketing (Paperless programs, Twitter role-play, etc.)
• Dual/Multiple identities of individual internet users
• Social Media Performance (YouTube song covers, Vine compilations, etc.)

Please send 250-300 word abstracts to Zach Dailey (zach.dailey@ttu.edu) by October 27th, 2017.

Thank you very much,

Zach Dailey, M.A.

Ph.D. Student, Texas Tech University

School of Theatre and Dance

[1] Micha Kaufman, “The Internet Revolution is the New Industrial Revolution,” Forbes. Published Online 5 October 2012. Accessed 7 October 2017.