Interdisciplinary Performative Pedagogies
With members from a range of disciplines and international perspectives, the IPP working group is concerned with the varied intersections between theatre/performance, pedagogy(ies) and society(ies).
KEYWORDS
- collaborative performance practices
- actor education methodologies
- applied theatre pedagogies
- interdisciplinary and performative approaches to teaching and learning
- critical and transformative theatre pedagogies
GROUP EMAIL ADDRESS
ipp.iftr@gmail.com
CONVENORS
Prof Aleksandar Dundjerovic (UK/Canada) and Dr Paola Botham (UK/Chile) - Centre for Interdisciplinary Performative Arts at the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire, Birmingham City University
CALL FOR PAPERS FOR COLOGNE 2025
For IFTR 2025, ‘Performing Carnival!’, at the University of Cologne (9-13 June), we invite academic and practice contributions that address the conference theme from the point of view of interdisciplinarity and/or pedagogy, using the three keywords suggested:
Ecstasy – the affective dimension in collaborative performance practices and contemporary actor education; the joyous excess of transgressing discipline boundaries; learning as a communal experience.
Subversion – challenging hierarchical pedagogical structures: teacher/student, director/actor, Global North/Global South epistemologies; activist applications of theatrical (in)disciplines; humour as a cross-disciplinary tool.
Metamorphosis – transforming physical and digital stages through interdisciplinary collaboration; transitional stages in education and training; the transformative power of learning and unlearning; emancipatory pedagogies.
Please note that the above list is not exhaustive. Also, as per IFTR guidelines, we will consider proposals that focus on the working group’s interests without following the specific topic of this year’s conference.
Abstracts of 200 to 250 words should be submitted via the IFTR Cambridge Core portal. Please note that you must become a member – or renew your membership – to be able to submit. Visit https://www.cambridge.org/core/membership/iftr to do so.
The deadline for abstracts is 15 January 2025.
We look forward to hearing from scholars, practitioners and educators from different disciplines and at any stage in their careers, including postgraduate students. Please select ‘Interdisciplinary Performative Pedagogies’ as you submit your abstract for the working group. If you have any questions, feel free to contact the convenors: Aleksandar Dundjerovic (aleksandar.dundjerovic@bcu.ac.uk) and Paola Botham (paola.botham@bcu.ac.uk).
MISSION STATEMENT
The aims of the Interdisciplinary Performative Pedagogies Working Group are:
· To examine the origins of interdisciplinary live performative pedagogies within an international context, including digital (online), physical and hybrid interactions.
· To draw connections between existing theatre pedagogies – including contemporary approaches to actor education, community engagement, etc. – and apply them in cross-disciplinary collaborations with other areas.
· To explore the impact that live and digital performance practices and methodologies can have within other fields of scholarship through pedagogical approaches (in architecture, film, visual arts, politics, historiography, etc.).
· To interrogate the relationships between audiences, participants and performers within interdisciplinary performance practices and the transformative potential of performative pedagogies in theatre, culture and society.
Although IPP is a relatively new group at the Federation, we have organised interim meetings between the annual IFTR conferences and are developing a growing portfolio of publications (see below). The actual shape of the group’s meeting at IFTR 2025 in Cologne will be decided on receipt of this year’s abstracts, but it is likely that it will mirror the structure of general panels, with 20 minutes allocated to each presenter, plus questions.
RECENT ACTIVITIES
Officially recognised at IFTR 2022 in Reykjavik, IPP organised the workshop ‘Andy in Brazil’ at ETSAM (UPM), Madrid, in March 2023, and had its inaugural meeting at IFTR 2023 in Accra. After the IFTR 2024 sessions in Manila, IPP held an interim meeting as part of the hybrid conference ‘The Performativity of Politics in Digital Media, Arts and Culture’ (University of Arts in Belgrade, October 2024).
PUBLICATIONS
Live Digital Theatre: Interdisciplinary Performative Pedagogies (Routledge, 2023), by Aleksandar Sasha Dundjerović, explores the experiences of practitioners working on digital performance. Collaborating with world-leading companies associated to the IPP working group – Kolectiv Theatre (UK), Teatro Os Satyros (Brazil) and The Red Curtain International (India) – the study investigates ways to bring live digital performance into theatre training and performance making.
Digital Performing Arts: Participatory Practices in a Digital Age (University of Arts in Belgrade, 2023), edited by Aleksandar Dundjerović and Ivan Pradvić, is an open-access collection of essays from the eponymous international conference in 2022. The conference brought together researchers and practitioners from various disciplines, including several IPP members who contributed chapters to this volume.
The article ‘Interdisciplinary Pedagogical Environments in Architectural Education’ (Charrette 8.2, 2022, pp.33-43), by María José Martínez Sánchez and Aleksandar Dundjerovic, examines creative dialogues in architecture, landscape and performance practice that can be applied to the creation of new intersectional knowledge in various fields. The two case studies discussed are drawn from IPP practical projects.
CURRENT MEMBERS (in alphabetical order)
Dr Alice Bell, University of Lincoln, UK
Rodolfo García Vázquez, Director of Os Satyros, Sao Paulo, Brazil
Dr Christopher Garrard, University of Exeter, UK
Dr Carla Hamer, Birmingham City University, UK
Dr Rebecca Hillman, University of Exeter, UK
Prof Asha Kuthari Chaudhuri, Gauhati University, Assam, India
Sumit Lai Roy, President of Red Curtain International, Kolkata, India
Dr Andrew Lennon, Birmingham City University, UK
Dr María Nieves Martínez de Olcoz, Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Spain
Prof María José Martínez Sánchez, Robert Gordon University, Scotland, UK
Maja Milatovic-Ovadia, Royal Central School of Speech and Drama, University of London, UK
Prof Jüri Nael, Estonian Academy of Music and Theatre, Estonia
Dr Hannah Phillips, Director of Mobilise Arts, UK
Jingya Peng, Royal Birmingham Conservatoire, UK
Prof Ivan Pravdić, University of Novi Sad, Serbia
Prof Persephone Sextou, Leeds Beckett University, UK
Prof Stephen Simms, Royal Birmingham Conservatoire, UK
Dr Svetlana Volic, University of Arts in Belgrade, Serbia