Conference II

‘The Interweaving of Performance Cultures’

Between the Two Mediterranean Shores and Beyond

An International conference: homage to Pr Dr Abderrahmane Ben Zidane

Tangier, May 23-24, 2009

Call for papers

Human cultures live constantly in a process of symbolic and material exchange. Still, there is
always an excess of continuum between essential sameness and marked strangeness. The recent
debates 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 as
an exemplary demystifier – the thinker who has provided unsurpassed critiques of Eurocentric
intercultural performance elements that lurk in the work of various western theatrical enterprises
that 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 from
which it is taken – but rather a situation completely specific within its own culture or a completely
specific problem having its origin within its own theatre” (1990: 283). Indeed, only few researchers
go back to the Indian origins of Mahabharata, while everyone celebrates the achievements of Peter
Brook, for instance.
For more than ten years our concern with theatrical hybridity was central to our study of the
various forms the subalterns perform back while repeating Master models, yet in a different way or
rather a different sameness of “almost the same, but not quite” (Bhabha 1994: 86). But do we have
to consider hybridity as the ultimate and inexorable condition of all postcolonial subjectivities? Or
shall we think of it as a road map leading to alternative exchanges? We know that these postcolonial
subjectivities 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 the
research program entitled “The Interweaving of Performance Cultures” developed by the eminent
Professors Erica Fisher-Lichte and Gabriele Brandsletter at the Freie University in Berlin. Such
research creates new horizons for the diversity of performance that has an incredible capacity to
incorporate and integrate diasporic identities and migrating groups.
What bestows the Mediterranean performance traditions with a particular touch is the fact that
they mirror the multiple facets of diverse cultures that have coexisted within the Mediterranean
space: an irregular and fertile region for the Europeans, Arabs, Imazighen, and Africans... The
conference places this diversity of performance cultures in the core of its debates, and in fact it is a
worthy study and research theme that brings out discourses and scientific studies about the
entwining of performance traditions within the two banks of the Mediterranean sea from past to
present. Our objectives are also the location of middle-grounds of performativity where binary
relationships dissolve and become more and more intertwined, and ultimately the search for
thematic and conceptual crossovers of different performance practices.
Résidence AYA N° 50, Rue Mahatma Ghandi, Tanger 90 000, Maroc
E-mail: khamine55@gmail.com, Tél/Fax: (212) 393330466, Portable: 064596791
Compte Bancaire: 164- 640- 21214 90077510009- 61 (Banque Populaire Tanger-Tétouan, Ain Ktiou)
Web: http://icpsresearch.blogspot.com
The Organizing Committee invites papers and panel propositions from scholars of all relevant disciplines – such as
Performance 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. The
establishment 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 students
whose papers are accepted will receive free conference registration, free admission to conference luncheon, and a
one-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 previous
conference.

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.ma

Guests who will arrive in Tangier before the conference can stay at Hotel Chellah*** A, at the same conference
rates (30 Euros each, single room with TV and private bath, breakfast and lunch included). The price of a double
room 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 same
discount 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 the
organizing 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.

Résidence AYA N° 50, Rue Mahatma Ghandi, Tanger 90 000, Maroc

E-mail: khamine55@gmail.com, Tél/Fax: (212) 393330466, Portable: 064596791
Compte Bancaire: 164- 640- 21214 90077510009- 61 (Banque Populaire Tanger-Tétouan, Ain Ktiou)
Web: http://icpsresearch.blogspot.com
Academic Co-conveners

• Khalid Amine, Coordinator of the Research Group of Performance Studies, Abdelmalek Essaâdi University,
Tétouan & President of the International Center for Performance Studies, Morocco khamine55@gmail.com
• Andrew Hussey, Dean of the University of London Institute in Paris (ULIP), nuh@aber.ac.uk
• Allen Hibard, Director of the Middle East Centre at Middle Tennessee State University, USA, ahibbard@mtsu.edu
• Barry Tharaud, editor and publisher of the international scholarly journal, Nineteenth-Century Prose; Professor
at Doğuş University, İstanbul, Adjunct Professor, San Diego State University, U.S.A., barrytharaud@yahoo.com
• José Manuel Goï Pérez, Professor at the Department of European Languages, University of Wales, Aberystwyth,
jsg@aber.ac.uk
• George F. Roberson, Researcher at the Geography Human Dimensions Research Group, University of
Massachusetts – Amherst, USA, pelerinmondial@yahoo.com
• Salah M. Moukhlis, Associate Professor of Comparative Studies and World Literatures, California State
University San Marcos, USA, smoukhli@csusm.edu

The Organizing Committee

• Nadia Khoumbarek, ICPS Member

• Rajae Khaloufi, ICPS member
• Alfred Hackensberger, Poet & Journalist, Germany
• Mustapha Hilal Soussi, ICPS member
• Mohamed Yassin El Harruchi, ICPS member
• Badreddine Charab, ICPS member & volunteers

Languages:

Arabic, Tamazight, French, Spanish, and English.

Résidence AYA N° 50, Rue Mahatma Ghandi, Tanger 90 000, Maroc

E-mail: khamine55@gmail.com, Tél/Fax: (212) 393330466, Portable: 064596791
Compte Bancaire: 164- 640- 21214 90077510009- 61 (Banque Populaire Tanger-Tétouan, Ain Ktiou)
Web: http://icpsresearch.blogspot.com