Towards a pedagogy of cultural translation: Challenges for an international classroom

Abstract

The author explores the epistemological, methodological and ethical conditions of international scholarship in Performance Studies. She begins with a discussion of the differences and common grounds between Anglo-American Performance Studies and continental European Theatre Studies (Theaterwissenschaft). She pleads for considering the histories of the sciences as a point of departure for the question of what the theorization and practice of international performance research could mean under global conditions. What are the challenges concerning the power of discourse? How to avoid unifying concepts and approaches? How to come to terms with the inter-trans-ultra-intra-cultural approaches which seem to lead to an overkill of positivist taxonomies in Performance Studies? The quest for recognition and redistribution in the process of questioning the very sovereignty of national traditions and territories that goes along with this claim informs the discussion of cultural differences in International Performance Research.