Table of Contents
Double issue: v. 9 no. 1 & 2
Abstract
The editors of this research review have focussed mainly on the mass media of radio and TV, neglecting theatre. All of us may forget that most genres of popular performative arts - our soap operas, comedy and variety shows - have had their origins in the live audience experience of vaudeville and romantic melodramas. We forget, too, that many stars ofTV and film feel the need, at least occasionally, to get back to the live stage and nourish their acting with the magic unity of actors and audience. And much of the creativity of dramatic performance today begins with more exploratory theatre 'off Broadway' or away from other sites of conventional, professional theatre.
Theatre is always entertainment, but in its most creative moments it is also an imaginative space in which to explore the human, social and political questions of the day. When theatre becomes too much ofa trivial fashion of a leisure class, new forms of theatre spring up around the fringes to revitalise the dramatic experience and bring it back closer to the life of the community. It is not surprising that some of the most interesting th.eatre in recent years are forms of experimental theatre. Noris it surprising that in countries or places where conventional, professional theatre dominates less - Pinochet's Chile, Calcutta in the 1950s & 1960s, the West Bank of Palestine or the black, 'apartheid' communities of South Africa - theatre becomes an arena for vital cultural debate. Significantly, these new forms of theatre have come to be called 'popular', or, in better English, 'people's theatre'.
A recent issue of Communication Research Trends, 'New Perspectives on Media and Culture' (Vol8/2) reported some of the current debates on communication and culture, but largely from an Anglo-American view. In many parts of the world, notably in Africa, India and Asia, similar questions emerge more pointedly in discussions about the role of theatre in society. This issue focusses on popular theatre in the light of communication and culture especially in non-Western cultures.
Recommended Citation
(1998)
"Popular Theatre,"
Communication Research Trends: Vol. 9:
No.
1, Article 1.
Available at:
https://scholarcommons.scu.edu/crt/vol9/iss1/1