Natalie Alvarez – författare

What happens to politics when it takes the form of theatre? How has theatre both exploited and undermined politics both in society and on the stage?Theatre & Politics explores the complex relationship between theatre and politics, questioning some of the assumptions that often arise when they are brought together. Challenging ideas about 'entertainment' and 'communication', the book draws on a broad range of key writing from Plato to Rancière, and theatrical examples from Shakespeare and his adaptors through Peter Handke to debbie tucker green.

What do we mean when we talk about bodies in theatre? And how does theatre affect the way we think about the human body?Bodies are vital elements of theatre production and spectatorship. But the body is not just physical, it is also conceptual. Drawing on many examples from contemporary performance, Theatre & the Body is a provocative starting point for understanding the surprisingly complex relationship between theatre and the body. Concise and clear, this book explores the revealing tensions between the body, bodies, language, representation and movement in the theatre. Foreword by Marina Abramovic.

Theatre & Sexuality explains the critical validity of using sexuality as a lens for examining theatre's creation and reception. The book offers clear introductions to sexual identity politics, ways of 'reading' sexuality on stage and a select history of LGBTQ theatre, including a reading of Split Britches/Bloolips' production Belle Reprieve.

In a time of intensifying xenophobia and anti-immigration measures, this book examines the impulse to acquire a deeper understanding of cultural others. Immersions in Cultural Difference takes readers into the heart of immersive simulations, including a simulated terrorist training camp in Utah; mock Afghan villages at military bases in Canada and the UK; a fictional Mexico-US border run in Hidalgo, Mexico; and an immersive tour for settlers at a First Nations reserve in Manitoba, Canada. Natalie Alvarez positions the phenomenon of immersive simulations within intersecting cultural formations: a neoliberal capitalist interest in the so-called “experience economy” that operates alongside histories of colonization and a heightened state of xenophobia produced by War on Terror discourse. The author queries the ethical stakes of these encounters, including her own in relation to the field research she undertakes. As the book moves from site to site, the reader discovers how these immersions function as intercultural rehearsal theaters that serve a diverse set of strategies and pedagogical purposes: they become a “force multiplier” within military strategy, a transgressive form of dark tourism, an activist strategy, and a global, profit-generating practice for a neoliberal capitalist marketplace.

Why should the digital bring about ideas of progress in the theatre arts? This question opens up a rich seam of provocative and original thinking about the uses of new media in theatre, about new forms of cultural practice and artistic innovation, and about the widening purposes of the theatre's cultural project in a changing digital world. Through detailed case-studies on the work of key international theatre companies such as the Elevator Repair Service and The Mission Business, Bill Blake explores how the digital is providing new scope for how we think about the theatre, as well as how the theatre in turn is challenging how we might relate to the digital.

How does protest engage with theatre? What does theatre have to gain from protest?Theatre and protest are often closely interlinked in the contemporary cultural and political landscape, and the line between protest and performance is often difficult to draw. Yet this relationship is also beset with doubts about theatre’s capacity to intervene in the social world. This fresh and insightful text thinks through the intersections and tensions between theatre and protest. Exploring the cross-fertilization of international theatre and protest across the 12th and 21st centuries, Lara Shalson illuminates how and why these two are mutually influencing and enriching forms.

How has theatre represented the rural? And how does a re-viewing of theatre of and in the rural help to build and complicate our sense of place?Theatre & the Rural explores the different ways in which theatre has performed the rural from the medieval to the contemporary, and examines the changing relationships between place, performance and audience when theatre is staged in rural communities. The book argues that theatre has a key role to play in both producing and potentially changing understandings of the rural, challenging dominant views of the relationships between city and country which can affect the political, social and cultural lives of the nation.

Theatre and war have long been bedfellows. This brief study looks beyond theatre that is about war, and instead focuses on the relationship between theatre and war: how they feed into and inform one another, from rehearsal to post-production analysis. The study builds on the premise that theatre and war share a deep kinship that finds its consummate expression in the very phrase ‘theatre of war.’This critical look at the entangled history of theatre and war asks pressing questions that remain pertinent to our current moment: how have the tools of theatre been used in the waging of war? How have the tools of waging war been used in the making of performance? What are the ‘shared interests’ of theatre and war? And how has performance become a militarized paradigm?

Theatre and Medicine offers a tour of this interdisciplinary terrain. Organized into four distinct topics, each represents crucial ways of understanding the theatre-medicine relationship. From discussions on the somatic underpinnings of the body that medicine and theatre take as their subject through to the historical association of theatre and contagion, and the pervasive role of doctors and the practitioners of alternative medicine in Western theatre and role of patients on and off stage. Together, this brief study considers the institutional contexts of theatre’s medical performances in the early twenty-first century.

How has Australia developed, culturally? What is the relationship between European theatre and Aboriginal performance? How do the concepts of memory, space, and love intersect and inform all Australian drama?Theatre and Australia is a stark look at the signal contradictions that make up the nation’s sense of self. Exploring how race, gender, and community have influenced Australia’s cultural development, this book reveals the history of Australian theatre as a tussle with questions of identity that can neither be entirely repudiated nor fully resolved.This concise study traverses the narrative of Australian theatre since white settlement, examining some of the main plays and performances of the last 230 years, and illuminating the relationship between European, non-Indigenous, and First Nations drama.

What is a dramaturg? What is dramaturgy? What are the political implications for the way that plays produce meaning in performance?Over the last decade, the role of the dramaturg has become more common in the theatrical process, but it is still a new term for many theatre-goers. Theatre & Dramaturgy offers a working definition of what dramaturgy means, and asks how understanding theatre from the perspective of dramaturgy can help us understand the world around us.This concise study examines how western histories and practices of theatre have functioned to achieve their effects, through understanding dramaturgy as the arrangement or structure of the work in time and space – both at the fictional level and in relation to performance. Exploring the relationship between plays and their meaning in production, this guide focuses on how understanding dramaturgy is critical to understanding how plays achieve their effects.

How does tourism impact theatre? How do theatrical ways of seeing, knowing, and acting shape tourism? How do economic and political processes like colonization or neoliberalization influence them both? And what is the future of these twinned global leisure industries?Theatre and tourism are kindred practices. Both engage their patrons in experiences of temporary escape to distant places, times, or different lives. Both stage expressive, communicative, embodied encounters in real time and space. Tourism and theatre are both sites of public pedagogy, cultural diplomacy, and cosmopolitan consciousness, promising pleasure and knowledge from the spectacle of others and elsewheres. This concise study explores the historical and contemporary entanglement of theatre and tourism, and speculates about the future as emerging technologies reshape both industries, offering new experiences of presence, embodiment, and mobility.

What is the relationship between theatre and class? How has this relationship developed over time, from the age of empire to the advent of social democracy and on to contemporary times? What impact has late capitalism had on the theatre industry? What effect has the reduction of government funding for the arts had on career prospects for actors from working-class backgrounds?Theatre and Class is a stark look at the evolution of the political economy in Western society. Exploring the historical development of the notions of 'class', as well as the contemporary debates that still surround this issue, this book reveals how the ascending middle class took centre stage in both the theatre and the public sphere.This concise study traverses the challenging history of 'class' in the 19th, 20th and 21st centuries and, through a number of case studies, examines 'class' as a performance both in the theatre and in wider society.

Theatre and Race centers on the interrelationship of the words on either side of the ampersand. It offers an accessible overview of how race is performed and how western theatrical practice has wrestled with the topic, question, and “problem” of racial difference over centuries.This study introduces critical and theoretical concepts to account for how the simple act of being attentive to the seeming “otherness” of another person within the expressive arts, as well as in everyday life, invites an engagement with the social history and lived experience of race.In addition, it spotlights the long history of race and racial concerns within the theatre: the xenophobic fascination of ancient Greeks and Romans, the anxiety caused by cultural and religious difference during the Elizabethan period, the intense and widespread appeal of blackface minstrelsy alongside the performances of other “faces” in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the controversies related to colorblind casting practices toward the end of the last century, and recent campaigns for and against antiracist and post-race theatre.This updated and revised edition includes new material by Harvey Young addressing Theatre and Race in 2024 and beyond.

What motivates North American Indigenous theatre? What differentiates this type of theatre, and what informs its culture? To what extent does this reality contend with the Western theatrical expectation of a radicalized "Indian"? This brief study explores key concepts that shape and motivate North American Indigenous theatre, while providing insight and best practices for understanding and appreciating Indigenous plays.Explored through four key topics - being and knowing, relationships, time, and aesthetics - and textually supported by the works of playwrights like Yvette Nolan Monique Mojica, and Mary Kathryn Nagle, Theatre and Indigeneity brings Indigenous studies theories and conversations to bear on Indigenous theatre so that readers are better prepared to understand and assess encounters with Indigenous theatre and performance.

What are neurodiverse aesthetics? How and where do neurodiverse aesthetics appear, and how do they positively affect the wider theatrical culture? How can we all contribute to a neurodiversity-affirming theatre industry?This brief study celebrates neurodiversity and deconstructs neuronormativity, reminding us that the most interesting, creative, and powerful things occur when we embrace different ways of thinking and understanding.Exploring the social, political, and creative histories of neurodivergent theatre-makers, Theatre and Neurodiversity not only delves into the intersections of theatre and the Neurodiversity Movement (with actionable advice for supporting neurodiversity and accessibility included), but also looks to the future of theatre making, highlighting the importance of neurodiversity-affirming creative practices.

How does the theatrical world interact with spirits? How do spirits gain agency through performance? How have modern-day theatrical conventions been dictated by multi-generational attitudes towards spirits? This brief study examines close relationship between theatre and spirits, a relationship manifested through ritual and religious practice, tracing the the changing attitudes towards spirits through theatre history.Touching on international ideas such as Japan's noh, Korea's gut, Malaysia's mah yong, and Greek Drama, Theatre and Spirits combines theatre studies with ritual, religion, and performance studies, concisely explaining the complex relationship between theatre and the spirit world it may evoke: through the lens of theatre, everyday ritual and religious practice can also be understood at the level of theatricality.

How is immersive and interactive technology integrated into theatre? How did the 'digital boom' and Covid-19 pandemic expand this integration? How does this integration affect the work, and the accessibility of the work?This brief study examines the intersection of the augmented, mixed, and virtual reality technologies with theatre, exploring how this intersection has exploded over the last 15 years and how it can shape the art form moving forward.Explored through four interlinked topics - immersion, interactivity, inclusion, and collaboration - Theatre and The Virtual celebrates the strengths of using this technology in creating theatre, whilst also recognizing the challenges of limited circulation and unequal access. In doing so, this concise guide investigates what the future of theatre may look like.

This collection promises to be a cornerstone in the field of performance studies and human rights activism. By mixing scholarly chapters with artists’ manifestos or “interruptions” it promotes the idea of the collective work between academia and social movements. Not only is it very timely, theoretically savvy, and well written, it also brings together scholars, activists, artists, and artivists in a very fluid, collective approach, something many of us strive to do.”—           Paola S. Hernández, University of Wisconsin, USAThis book charts the changing frontiers of activism in the Americas. Travelling Canada, the US, the US-Mexico border, Chile, Argentina, Brazil, Cuba, Colombia, and Indigenous territories on Turtle Island, it invites readers to identify networks, clusters, and continuities of art-activist tactics designed to exceed the event horizon of the performance protest. Essays feature Indigenous artists engaging in land-based activism and decolonial cyberactivism, grass-roots movements imagining possible futures through cross-sector alliance building, art-activists forwarding tactics of reinvention, and student groups in the throes of theatrical assembly. Artist pages, interspersed throughout the collection, serve as animated, first-person perspectives of those working on the front lines of interventionist art. Taken together, the contributions offer a vibrant picture of emergent tactics and strategies over the past decade that allow art-activists to sustain the energy and press of political resistance in the face of a whole host of rights emergencies across the Americas.Winner of the Excellence in Editing Award from the Association for Theatre in Higher Education and recipient of an Honourable Mention for the Patrick O'Neill Prize administered by the Canadian Association for Theatre Research. Project Artists:- The Great Collective Cough-In – L.M. Bogad- Le Temps d’une Soupe – ATSA- For Freedoms – Hank Willis Thomas and Eric Gottesman- Down with Self-Management! Re-Booting Ourselves as Feminist Servers – subRosa- Journey for Activism and Sustainability Escola de Ativismo- Unstoppable – micha cárdenas, Patrisse Cullors, Chris Head and Edxie Betts- Listen to Black Women – Syrus Marcus Ware- Notes on Sustainable Tools – Fred Moten and Stefano Harney, with Suné Woods- The Mirror Shield Project – Cannupa Hanska Luger- The Human Billboard Project – Leah Decter, with Stop Violence Against Aboriginal Women Action Group