Message posted on 18/12/2024
Call for chapters for edited volume
Dear members of the Visual Anthropology Network,
We would like to share the following call for chapters for an edited volume
with you:
***
Documenting ephemeral heritage: performance in times of crisis
* * *
Outlines
We are looking for some contributions to the publication project outlined
below, which emerged from our panel *Documenting performance-based cultural
heritage in times of crisis* at SIEF congress in Brno (2023). We are
inviting early career, mid-career, and established scholars to submit an
abstract.
Concept Note
Argument
Heritage and crisis connect in multiple ways. We are living in
unprecedented times of crisis, uncertainty and swift social changes.
Performance, be it dance, theatre, music, rituals or other live events that
cross boundaries often embodies and reflects such sociocultural changes.
This is also the point of view of the UNESCO, which views living heritage
as threatened in a variety of ways, by negative attitudes, demographic
issues, economic pressure, decontextualisation, environmental degradation,
weakened practice and transmission, cultural globalisation, new products
and techniques, loss of objects or systems. Yet, in moments of crisis
communities turn to heritage in order to cope with crisis (UNESCO 2003).
Documenting performance-based cultural heritage is therefore crucial as
heritage connects communities and places to their history and identity. In
contrast, its erasure impacts on communities’ sense of belonging and
resilience. However, performance is intrinsically inconstant - as Marcia B.
Siegel pointed out, "dance exists at the perpetual vanishing point" [and
is] "an event that disappears in the very act of materialising" (1968). But
then, as performance-based cultural heritage is by nature aleatory and
impermanent, what does it mean to document it? This is the question that is
being addressed in this book, which will address some of the challenges
posed by performance documentation.
Documenting potentially includes many practices and many perspectives. As a
matter of fact, it can only capture partial aspects of phenomena. It may
differ according to the purpose of documentation, e.g. whether the focus is
placed on aesthetics, on body movements, on social relationships.
Furthermore, documentation is by necessity a socially and culturally
situated act, that is dependent on the perception of the person who is
documenting. And it has, by itself, an impact on what is to be documented.
Discussions on preservation and reconstruction of dance performances,
notably in Eastern Europe and the US, have highlighted how documentation
practices are bound to be recreations (Thomas, 2003). Therefore,
documentation is also a creative act. It can mean reconstructing a
performance, thereby contributing to the re-creation, re-shaping and
re-birth of cultural heritage. It also means making sense of history and
politics, tracing or bringing back to the present different “versions” of
performances that may or may not be considered as relevant or acceptable
any longer. And furthermore, in an age saturated by social media, the tools
for documentation, but also, the actors who may be documenting, have
changed. These facts pose crucial questions regarding performance
documentation: in which ways do modalities of documentation alter
practices? What effect does this have on communities, but also, on the ways
the concerned performances are perceived? What does it mean to document
heritage performance in an age saturated by social media? Who should
document?
This book addresses the need for literature focusing on documenting
performance-based cultural heritage, a need to look beyond guidelines
produced by international organisations and beyond a national or regional
focus. In this edited book, we want to look beyond genres, to include any
type of performance-based cultural heritage, across regions and categories.
We invite papers that engage critically with the challenges of documenting
performance-based cultural heritage. We welcome both theoretical and
ethnographic studies from any geographical region.
Book themes
- Questioning the documentation process as an active intervention on
performance
- Analysis of specific cases of performance documentation
- Relationship between knowledge transmission and documentation
- Issues of ownership, belonging and authenticity
Possible focus areas
- Documentation produced by communities to safeguard performances and
institutional knowledge production
- Archives and repositories, community archives, citizens’ archives
- The repertoire
- Sensory documentation
- Multimodal ethnography
Submission guidelines
Please send an abstract of maximum 500 words, including the title of your
article, your name, your affiliation and a very short background to:
*monica.mottin
AT hcts.uniheidelberg DOT de, barbara.curda AT gmail DOT com*.
Please send your abstract as a Word attachment. On the subject line, please
put: Documenting performance in times of crisis.
Submission schedule:
- Deadline for submission of abstracts: 20th of December 2024
- Notification of acceptance of abstracts: 31st of January 2025
Editors
- Monica Mottin (University of Heidelberg)
- Barbara Čurda (Barbara Čurda (Université Clermont Auvergne (UCA),
laboratoire ACTé (UR 4281), France, & Institut Français de Pondichéry
(IFP).)
Catégories
- Ethnologie, anthropologie
(Catégorie
principale)
- Sociétés >
Sociologie
- Esprit et Langage
> Épistémologie
et méthodes >
Épistémologie
- Sociétés >
Géographie
Dates
- vendredi 20 décembre 2024
Mots-clés
- performance, heritage, methodology
Contacts
- Barbara Čurda
*courriel :* barbara [dot] curda [at] gmail [dot] com
- Monica Mottin
*courriel :* monica [dot] mottin [at] hcts [dot] uniheidelberg [dot] de
Source de l'information
- Barbara Čurda
*courriel :* barbara [dot] curda [at] gmail [dot] com
Licence
[image: CC-BY-4.0] Cette
annonce est mise à disposition selon les termes de la Creative Commons -
Attribution 4.0 International - CC BY 4.0
.
To cite this annoucement
Barbara Čurda, Monica Mottin, « Documenting ephemeral heritage: performance
in times of crisis », Appel à contribution, *Calenda*, Publié le mardi 19
novembre 2024, https://doi.org/10.58079/12pl7
***
With best regards,
Monica Mottin
and
Barbara Curda
_______________________________________________
Vaneasa mailing list
Vaneasa@lists.easaonline.org
http://lists.easaonline.org/listinfo.cgi/vaneasa-easaonline.org
view formatted text
We would like to share the following call for chapters for an edited volume
with you:
***
Documenting ephemeral heritage: performance in times of crisis
* * *
Outlines
We are looking for some contributions to the publication project outlined
below, which emerged from our panel *Documenting performance-based cultural
heritage in times of crisis* at SIEF congress in Brno (2023). We are
inviting early career, mid-career, and established scholars to submit an
abstract.
Concept Note
Argument
Heritage and crisis connect in multiple ways. We are living in
unprecedented times of crisis, uncertainty and swift social changes.
Performance, be it dance, theatre, music, rituals or other live events that
cross boundaries often embodies and reflects such sociocultural changes.
This is also the point of view of the UNESCO, which views living heritage
as threatened in a variety of ways, by negative attitudes, demographic
issues, economic pressure, decontextualisation, environmental degradation,
weakened practice and transmission, cultural globalisation, new products
and techniques, loss of objects or systems. Yet, in moments of crisis
communities turn to heritage in order to cope with crisis (UNESCO 2003).
Documenting performance-based cultural heritage is therefore crucial as
heritage connects communities and places to their history and identity. In
contrast, its erasure impacts on communities’ sense of belonging and
resilience. However, performance is intrinsically inconstant - as Marcia B.
Siegel pointed out, "dance exists at the perpetual vanishing point" [and
is] "an event that disappears in the very act of materialising" (1968). But
then, as performance-based cultural heritage is by nature aleatory and
impermanent, what does it mean to document it? This is the question that is
being addressed in this book, which will address some of the challenges
posed by performance documentation.
Documenting potentially includes many practices and many perspectives. As a
matter of fact, it can only capture partial aspects of phenomena. It may
differ according to the purpose of documentation, e.g. whether the focus is
placed on aesthetics, on body movements, on social relationships.
Furthermore, documentation is by necessity a socially and culturally
situated act, that is dependent on the perception of the person who is
documenting. And it has, by itself, an impact on what is to be documented.
Discussions on preservation and reconstruction of dance performances,
notably in Eastern Europe and the US, have highlighted how documentation
practices are bound to be recreations (Thomas, 2003). Therefore,
documentation is also a creative act. It can mean reconstructing a
performance, thereby contributing to the re-creation, re-shaping and
re-birth of cultural heritage. It also means making sense of history and
politics, tracing or bringing back to the present different “versions” of
performances that may or may not be considered as relevant or acceptable
any longer. And furthermore, in an age saturated by social media, the tools
for documentation, but also, the actors who may be documenting, have
changed. These facts pose crucial questions regarding performance
documentation: in which ways do modalities of documentation alter
practices? What effect does this have on communities, but also, on the ways
the concerned performances are perceived? What does it mean to document
heritage performance in an age saturated by social media? Who should
document?
This book addresses the need for literature focusing on documenting
performance-based cultural heritage, a need to look beyond guidelines
produced by international organisations and beyond a national or regional
focus. In this edited book, we want to look beyond genres, to include any
type of performance-based cultural heritage, across regions and categories.
We invite papers that engage critically with the challenges of documenting
performance-based cultural heritage. We welcome both theoretical and
ethnographic studies from any geographical region.
Book themes
- Questioning the documentation process as an active intervention on
performance
- Analysis of specific cases of performance documentation
- Relationship between knowledge transmission and documentation
- Issues of ownership, belonging and authenticity
Possible focus areas
- Documentation produced by communities to safeguard performances and
institutional knowledge production
- Archives and repositories, community archives, citizens’ archives
- The repertoire
- Sensory documentation
- Multimodal ethnography
Submission guidelines
Please send an abstract of maximum 500 words, including the title of your
article, your name, your affiliation and a very short background to:
*monica.mottin
AT hcts.uniheidelberg DOT de, barbara.curda AT gmail DOT com*.
Please send your abstract as a Word attachment. On the subject line, please
put: Documenting performance in times of crisis.
Submission schedule:
- Deadline for submission of abstracts: 20th of December 2024
- Notification of acceptance of abstracts: 31st of January 2025
Editors
- Monica Mottin (University of Heidelberg)
- Barbara Čurda (Barbara Čurda (Université Clermont Auvergne (UCA),
laboratoire ACTé (UR 4281), France, & Institut Français de Pondichéry
(IFP).)
Catégories
- Ethnologie, anthropologie
(Catégorie
principale)
- Sociétés >
Sociologie
- Esprit et Langage
> Épistémologie
et méthodes >
Épistémologie
- Sociétés >
Géographie
Dates
- vendredi 20 décembre 2024
Mots-clés
- performance, heritage, methodology
Contacts
- Barbara Čurda
*courriel :* barbara [dot] curda [at] gmail [dot] com
- Monica Mottin
*courriel :* monica [dot] mottin [at] hcts [dot] uniheidelberg [dot] de
Source de l'information
- Barbara Čurda
*courriel :* barbara [dot] curda [at] gmail [dot] com
Licence
[image: CC-BY-4.0] Cette
annonce est mise à disposition selon les termes de la Creative Commons -
Attribution 4.0 International - CC BY 4.0
.
To cite this annoucement
Barbara Čurda, Monica Mottin, « Documenting ephemeral heritage: performance
in times of crisis », Appel à contribution, *Calenda*, Publié le mardi 19
novembre 2024, https://doi.org/10.58079/12pl7
***
With best regards,
Monica Mottin
and
Barbara Curda
_______________________________________________
Vaneasa mailing list
Vaneasa@lists.easaonline.org
http://lists.easaonline.org/listinfo.cgi/vaneasa-easaonline.org
