Performance and the Medical Body

Description

This edited collection focuses on performance practice and analysis that engages with medical and biomedical sciences. After locating the 'biologization' of theatre at the turn of the twentieth century, it examines a range of contemporary practices that respond to understandings of the human body as revealed by biomedical science. In bringing together a variety of analytical perspectives, the book draws on scholars, scientists, artists and practices that are at the forefront of current creative, scientific and academic research. Its exploration of the dynamics and exchange between performance and medicine will stimulate a widening of the debate around key issues such as subjectivity, patient narratives, identity, embodiment, agency, medical ethics, health and illness. In focusing on an interdisciplinary understanding of performance, the book examines the potential of performance and theatre to intervene in, shape, inform and extend vital debates around biomedical knowledge and practice in the contemporary moment.

Dr Alex Mermikides is Senior Lecturer in Drama at Kingston University, London, UK. Her research interest is in contemporary performance-making, with a particular focus on science-engaged devised performance. Publications include Devising in Process (2010, edited with Jackie Smart), and chapters in other collections. Dr Gianna Bouchard is Principal Lecturer in Drama at Anglia Ruskin University, Cambridge, UK. Her research focuses on contemporary performance and live art in relation to medical science. She is co-editor of 'On Medicine', a special issue of Performance Research, and her work has been published in various edited collections.

Anyone who keeps an open mind will be impressed by the potential of performance to both inspire and be inspired by debate around medical ethics and healthcare issues. -- Guy Glass * NYU School of Medicine's Literature Arts, and Medicine Database *