Imagining Human Rights in Twenty-First Century Theater Global Perspectives

There is extraordinary diversity, depth, and complexity in the encounter between theatre, performance, and human rights. Through an examination of a rich repertoire of plays and performance practices from and about countries across six continents, the contributors to this volume seek to open the way toward understanding the character and significance of this encounter. Divided into three interrelated sections, the book focuses on a range of critical and timely human rights questions as they relate to transitional justice, memory politics, citizenship, the 'War on Terror,' transnational spectatorship, and the global economic order. Authors ask what artists, audiences and readers imagine, expect, and desire from the engagement of theatre and performance with these crucial questions. Ultimately, this book aims to provide nuanced, global perspectives on the emerging and transformative aesthetics, ethics and effects of this encounter at the turn of the twenty-first century.

Florian Nikolas Becker is Associate Professor of German and Comparative Literature at Bard College and Director of Bard Programs at ECLA of Bard, a Liberal Arts University in Berlin. Paola S. Hernández is Associate Professor of Spanish at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She is the author of El teatro de Argentina y Chile: Globalización, resistencia y desencanto (2009). Brenda Werth is Associate Professor in the Department of World Languages and Cultures at American University in Washington D.C. She is author of Theatre, Performance, and Memory Politics in Argentina (2010).