In
the beginning there is a location. There also is an idea that someone
wants to express. Then there are performers. With a bit of luck there is
also an audience willing to receive what is expressed and give
feed-back to the performers. This interrelation between performer and
audience raises the notion that performers and audiences are sharing
performances since the audience could be seen as performing the
audience.
Cultural performances need audiences – that is what makes them cultural. The argument could be left at that, but since human beings are part of a culture (and often of several sub-cultures) it might be argued that the awareness of our own actions makes it possible for us to be our own audience.
Cultural performances need audiences – that is what makes them cultural. The argument could be left at that, but since human beings are part of a culture (and often of several sub-cultures) it might be argued that the awareness of our own actions makes it possible for us to be our own audience.
Points of view > Sauter (2000) presents an intriguing model of encounters with
objects. The model rests on three legs: the sensory level, the artistic
level and the symbolic level. The levels can be said to relay meaning in
the sense that the sensory level is about the momentary impression on
the observer, the artistic level is about the insight that this object
is man made and the third level concerns the symbolic communication
(Sauter 2000:103-107). This model might be used even for encounters with
human performances. A performance is an act but when it has been
presented it is all too easy to treat it as an object when we think of
it. It would be exciting to try this model on the concept of culture as
Ethnologists see culture.
You may argue that culture in a broad sense is one of the last areas
in society to be looked upon as economically important to society. The
European Task Force on Culture and Development (1997) argues that the
cultural capital of its member nations is an important asset for the
future of Europe. Not only will culture contribute to the accumulation
of human knowledge and understanding, it also will in the long term show
economic and social outcomes and even function as human capital and as a
means of empowerment and entitlement (In
from the margins 1997:31-32). This leads to that culture, if it is no
longer marginalized, will be taken seriously and play an important role
in the future development of the European Union. It might also be
interpreted as that the authors deploy a perspective on the concept of
culture comparable to the one used by Ethnologists.
Since I have been trained in Ethnology, I see the Ethnological concept of culture as an explanation of the meaning in our lives. Culture is a process that keeps us afloat and accessible to others within the same sphere. It is the “glue” that binds individuals together. Culture is as important to us as air is to birds. Without air, they would not be able to fly, but fall to the ground. Without culture in this sense we would not be able to live our lives as we know them today, nor have functioning societies. This way of thinking suggests that culture is a process that creates meaning, but also that culture change over time, since the meaning produced is fed back into the culture. This point of view is often referred to as the cultural turn. Ethnologists refer to the outcome of culture as “culture products”. In this concept we find books, paintings, movies and even ideas, and of course, performances, etc.
Hoogland (2005) tells the story of the new cultural policy concerning the regional theatre in Sweden in the 1970s. The intent of the Swedish government was that these somewhat avant-garde theatre groups were to establish themselves as regional hubs of culture. They made some plays based on the lives of their audiences. As time went by they lost the expression of freshness and started repeating themselves, having a fixed repertoire (Hoogland 2005:318 ff). Hoogland´s example of an effort from the government to support cultural activities in the Swedish countryside might be argued to show that the initiative described in In from the margins (ibid) is not so easy to deploy. At least it is difficult to predict the outcome of such an initiative.
Going all in > Ever since Franz Boas´ descriptions of the Potlatch ceremony
held by the Kwakiutl tribes on the northwest coast of North America in
1901 we have an example of a cultural performance with dire
consequences. The potlatch, a concept that is reported from several
parts of the world, was about giving away gifts, mostly blankets, which
were burnt upon reception. At the next potlatch the receiver of a gift
of for example a hundred blankets was supposed to top the gift given by
giving back even more blankets. These in turn were burnt. These
interactions probably built steady relations within these Indian tribes,
but it also resulted in misery since it really was not economically
sound to waste this individual surplus in this manner. The Kwakiutl
“went all-in” to use a poker-concept that means that you risk
everything. Most cultural performances today, in at least Scandinavia,
do not encompass that magnitude of attachment. Generally we do not risk
our individual economy or our welfare by cultural performances.
Now, this holds true as long as we remain amongst the acts performed by law-abiding citizens, but if we cross the line into criminality there is a whole other thing. The most recent example of someone going “all-in” in a cultural performance in the Nordic countries is Anders Behring Breivik, a Norwegian right-wing extremist. He is a confessed perpetrator of the Norway attacks on July 22nd 2011 – the bombing of government buildings in Oslo that killed eight people , and the mass shooting at a summer camp of the Workers' Youth League (AUF) of the Norwegian Labour Party on the island of Utøya where he killed 69 people, mostly teenagers. These actions can be described as a performance that is a rite of passage in the way Arnold van Gennep described it. Arnold van Gennep uses two sets of terms to describe the transition between the before and the after the passing of the rite. First, van Gennep uses the concepts separation, margin and reaggregation, but also with primary reference to spatial change: preliminal, liminal and postliminal (reproduced in Turner 1969:166). Breivik can be said to having become separated from the rest of society through his thinking and lack of followers, he is marginalized and living alone and after the deeds he is reaggregated in a whole other role. He went from being unknown to being hated in a couple of hours. Regarding Breivik the liminal experience can be said to consist of the prelimnail stage (his preparations), the liminal stage (Breivik being in Oslo and Utøya and performing his activities) and the postliminal stage (Breivik being arrested and brought back to Oslo to face justice). The media is continuing Breiviks performance, bringing it to us, the audience, in our homes via Internet and TV. Already now, some ten weeks after the incident, the first books discussing it are in the bookstores.
Feral (2002) argues that theatricality is about linking the spectator with what is looked at. There is some kind of perceptual dynamics in play that does not belong to the objects, the space, nor the actor himself, but each can become the vehicle of theatricality (Feral 2002:105). This suggests that this relationship, temporary as it might be, is about two entities making an agreement on what is going to take place. Feral describes this as a paradox of the actor that also is the paradox of the spectator (ibid:100). This relationship might be described as “I know that you know that I know (that I am pretending)” and vice versa. We might look upon this relationship, this contract, as a way of entering into an imaginary realm. In this realm anything might exist: vampires, werewolves, a man of steel who can fly, animals that speak, and more ordinary things like that the actor is a person from the 18th century. This also puts emphasis on the idea I presented earlier, that we may be playing parts in each others performances. Regarding the agreement between performer and spectator it is about accepting the other worlds or realms for some time. In a cultural performance such as Breivik´s he is performing and catching the attention of the audience, but he also relies heavily on the responses of the audience.
Loxley (2007) digs deep into J. L. Austin´s thinking on performativity and what performativity does. According to Loxley Austin sets up a list six rules for a successful performativity. The rules state that there must be an accepted conventional procedure with a certain conventional effect, that procedure to include the uttering of certain words by certain persons in certain circumstances. The persons and circumstances in any given case must appropriate for the invocation of the particular procedure invoked. The procedure must be executed by all participants, both correctly and completely. Where the procedure is designed for use by persons having certain thought or feelings, or for the inauguration of certain consequential conduct on the part of the participant, then a person participating in and so invoking the procedure must in fact have those thoughts or feelings, and the participants must intend so to conduct themselves, and further must actually so conduct themselves subsequently (Loxley 2007:1,9-10). If Austin´s rules hold up to measure, we do not recognize the message in the performativity if the rules are not abided. The performative aspects of an act, an utterance or even a gesture lies in that it is pointing in some direction, either out of the realm created by theatricality, or still deeper into it. In the Breivik case it can be argued that Breivik makes a clear direction in which he is pointing.
In a sense the Oslo/Utøya-incident also resembles what Schechner (1992) calls Direct theatre, the incident is staged in public spaces, the collective reflexivity is present both among the youngsters being chased on Utøya and in the way the audience reacts to the deeds (Schechner 1992:102-103). The deeds themselves are not mediatized, rather the effects of them that via media makes an impact on the audience in their homes.
As for Anders Behring Breivik himself he is being kept in isolation, the prosecutor has stopped him from reading his manifesto and wearing his pre-designed uniforms in court. While he still resides in the awareness of the audience round the world he is stopped from continuing his performance according to his own plans. One thought is that Breivik might be continuing his performance in his cell, being his own audience.
Final comments > This text is divided into two parts; the first part is about
the concept of culture and the second is a discussion of several
concepts in the reading list with the use of the Oslo/Utøya-massacre in
the summer of 2011. The question that was posed in the beginning about
whether it is possible that our awareness of our own actions makes it
possible for us to be our own audience has not yet been answered in
full, but it is thought well worth following. Returning to the heading
of this text “I´ll let you be in my performances – if I can be in yours”
I still have the impression that since cultural performances can be
said to be about interaction between individuals or between individuals
and crowds/audiences, we are all participating in each others
performances.
Literature
Féral, Josette. 2002. ”The Specificity of Theatrical Language”, In: Substance # 98/99, pp 94-108
Hoogland, Rikard. 2005. Summary. In: Spelet om teaterpolitiken, Stockholm, (diss.), pp 318-326
In From the Margins: A Contribution to the Debate on Culture and Development in
Europe, Strasburg, Council of Europe Publishing, 1997, pp. 25-32, 53-58.
Europe, Strasburg, Council of Europe Publishing, 1997, pp. 25-32, 53-58.
Loxley, James. 2007. Performativity, London & New York, Routledge.
Sauter, Willmar. 2000.”Culture as Human Encounter – A Theatrical Model of the Cultural Event”,
In; The Theatrical Event: Dynamics of Performance and Perception. Iowa City, pp 95-109
In; The Theatrical Event: Dynamics of Performance and Perception. Iowa City, pp 95-109
Schechner, Richard. 1992. ”Invasions Friendly and Unfriendly: The Dramaturgy of Direct Theater”,
In: Critical Theory and Performance, eds. J.G. Reinelt & J. Roach, Ann Arbor.
In: Critical Theory and Performance, eds. J.G. Reinelt & J. Roach, Ann Arbor.
Turner, Victor. 1969. The Ritual Process: Structure and Anti-Structure. Ithaca: Cornell University
Press.
Press.
* Paraphrasing a line in Bob Dylan´s Talkin' World War III Blues: “I’ll let you be in my dreams if I can be in yours” 1963.
