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Résidence AYA N° 50, Rue Mahatma Ghandi, Tanger 90 000, MarocE-mail:khamine55@gmail.com, Tél/Fax: (212) 393330466, Portable: 064596791Compte Bancaire: 164- 640- 21214 90077510009- 61 (Banque Populaire Tanger-Tétouan, Ain Ktiou)

Web: http://icpsresearch.blogspot.com

Conference II

‘The Interweaving of Performance Cultures’

Between the Two Mediterranean Shores and Beyond

International conference: homage to Pr Dr Abderrahmane Ben ZidaneTangier, May 23-24,

2009

Call for papers

Human cultures live constantly in a process of symbolic and material exchange. Still, there isalways an excess of continuum between essential sameness and marked strangeness. The recentdebates on the politics of intercultural theatre practice have not only critiqued such artistic‘syncretism’ and negotiations, but articulated an optimistic belief in the achievability of a common“interweaving” across worldwide performance cultures. Erica Fischer-Lichte is justly acclaimed asan exemplary demystifier – the thinker who has provided unsurpassed critiques of Eurocentricintercultural performance elements that lurk in the work of various western theatrical enterprisesthat went East & South. “The starting point for intercultural staging”, Fisher-Lichte rightly argues,“is thus not primarily an interest in the foreign – the foreign theatre or the foreign culture fromwhich it is taken – but rather a situation completely specific within its own culture or a completelyspecific problem having its origin within its own theatre” (1990: 283). Indeed, only few researchersgo back to the Indian origins of Mahabharata, while everyone celebrates the achievements of PeterBrook, for instance.For more than ten years our concern with theatrical hybridity was central to our study of thevarious forms the subalterns perform back while repeating Master models, yet in a different way orrather a different sameness of “almost the same, but not quite” (Bhabha 1994: 86). But do we haveto consider hybridity as the ultimate and inexorable condition of all postcolonial subjectivities? Orshall we think of it as a road map leading to alternative exchanges? We know that these postcolonialsubjectivities are just as diverse and their histories just as varied as the peoples who were colonized.Today, our conception of theatrical hybridity has become a source of some revisionism thanks to theresearch program entitled “The Interweaving of Performance Cultures” developed by the eminentProfessors Erica Fisher-Lichte and Gabriele Brandsletter at the Freie University in Berlin. Suchresearch creates new horizons for the diversity of performance that has an incredible capacity toincorporate and integrate diasporic identities and migrating groups.What bestows the Mediterranean performance traditions with a particular touch is the fact thatthey mirror the multiple facets of diverse cultures that have coexisted within the Mediterraneanspace: an irregular and fertile region for the Europeans, Arabs, Imazighen, and Africans... Theconference places this diversity of performance cultures in the core of its debates, and in fact it is aworthy study and research theme that brings out discourses and scientific studies about theentwining of performance traditions within the two banks of the Mediterranean sea from past topresent. Our objectives are also the location of middle-grounds of performativity where binaryrelationships dissolve and become more and more intertwined, and ultimately the search forthematic and conceptual crossovers of different performance practices.

Web: http://icpsresearch.blogspot.com

The Organizing Committee invites papers and panel propositions from scholars of all relevant disciplines – such asPerformance Studies, English, History, Ethno-Musicology, Cultural Studies, Communication, Sociology and Anthropology, Gender and Women’s Studies, Philosophy, Psychology – as well as from Artists. We especially encourage papers that focus on a critique of intercultural theatre Practices.

Proposals:

A 250-word abstract of proposed papers, along with brief curriculum vitae, must be submitted electronically (preferably in Word or Rich Text format

) by 31 December 2008

to the Organizing Committee care of Professor Khalid Amine (President of ICPS and Conference Convener). Selected conference papers will be published in a special volume.

Emerging Scholars’ Panel:

The conference is also a home for graduate students and emerging scholars from different parts of the world. Theestablishment of an emerging Scholars’ panel invites new voices to join the debate. Up to three participants will be selected for this panel, and each panelist will have fifteen minutes to deliver her/his paper. Graduate studentswhose papers are accepted will receive free conference registration, free admission to conference luncheon, and aone-year membership in ICPS. To be considered for this panel, please submit your 10-12-page

paper by January 15th 2009

to Pr Khalid Amine. Since the conference is again pulling a very international public,registered attendees will be welcome too.

Registration Fee:

$100 payable upon arrival. It includes 2 Receptions, conference pack, tickets for public concerts and site-specific performances, free guided tour of the medina, and the book of published proceedings from the previousconference.

Conference Location:

CHELLAH HOTEL, 47-49 Rue ALLAL BEN ABDELLAH –BP 399, Tangier, Morocco. Tel: (212-3) 932 10 02/3 Fax:(212-3) 932 09 98 email: ksarchellah@menara.maGuests who will arrive in Tangier before the conference can stay at Hotel Chellah*** A, at the same conferencerates (30 Euros each, single room with TV and private bath, breakfast and lunch included). The price of a doubleroom per night is 45 Euros, and triple 58 Euros (of course including breakfast and lunch). Those who wish to extend their stay in Tangier right after the conference will also benefit from the same discount: 70 % off. The samediscount will apply to participants’ companions and attendees.

Acceptance:

Submitters of accepted proposals will be notified within two weeks of the above deadline and all decisions of theorganizing committee are final.

Acceptance, however, unfortunately does not include any financial support - participants are responsible for their own funding (i.e. securing grants, etc.) to pay for travel and lodging expenses. Selected conference papers will be published in a special volume.