Textual and performative interventions: autobiographical stage writing as a rescription of the self

Textual and performative interventions: autobiographical stage writing as a rescription of the self

It is well-established that some types of performance and theatre both document and catalyse social and/or cultural change (Mitchell, Dupuis & Jonas-Simpson 2011; Epskamp 1989; Shank 1982). This idea is so influential that for decades many anthropologists have used the notion of theatre or performance to describe the way whole social and cultural systems work (Schechner 2004; Turner 1982; Goffman 1956). Similarly, certain types of writing document and catalyse individual or personal change processes (Baker 2013). In other words, writing can be understood as an intervention into subjectivity in the way that performance and theatre are interventions into social systems and cultural practices. Michel Foucault (1997) described this process as self-writing or self-bricolage. This paper focusses on stage writing as an intervention into subjectivity or identity and a catalyst for personal transformation.

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