Virginie Magnat

The resurgence of Occitan popular music traditions in France is coterminous with the emergence of postcolonial regionalism during the 1970s Larzac protests, following the wave of decolonization in the 1960s and anticipating the anti-globalization movement in subsequent decades. Situated within this continuum of postcolonial and transnational cultural activism, Occitan music practitioners are uniquely positioned to embody a radically inclusive conception of Occitan identity by embracing the intercultural dimension of their Mediterranean musical heritage. Reconciling regional specificity and cultural hybridity can thus offer creative ways of resisting nationalist constructions of identity and neoliberal representations of global culture.

Recipient of the Canadian Association for Theatre Research 2014 Ann Saddlemyer Book Award Honorable Mention.

TDR Review by Tanya Dean: "As both a scholar and a performer herself, Magnat’s research relies upon an interdisciplinary methodology, combining fieldwork, artistic collaboration with her subjects, and the articulation of her embodied research
through writing. The result is an insightful account of the
work of such artists as Rena Mirecka, Ewa Benesz, Katharina Seyferth, and Ang Gey Pin. This book will be a valuable resource for scholars interested in the work of Grotowski, Polish theatre, women theatre practitioners, as well as those engaged in practice‐as‐research."

As the first investigation of women's foremost contributions
to Grotowski's theatrical and post‐theatrical research, this
book is grounded in four years of multi‐sited fieldwork
conducted in Poland, Italy, France, and Denmark. Situated
at the intersection of performance studies, experimental
ethnography, and Indigenous research methodologies, this
exploration of the artistic journeys and current creative
practices of key women from different cultures and
generations is complemented by a Documentary Film Series
created in close collaboration with these artists and
featured on the Routledge Performance Archive
(www.routledgeperformancearchive.com).

This interdisciplinary exploration of voice seeks to open a space for the nondiscursive performative power of vocality in qualitative research. In the first part, I focus on anthropology and ethnographic practice to identify the ways in which “voice” gets muted when transformed by scriptocentrism (see Dwight Conquergood) into a conceptual abstraction or a metaphor. Given anthropology’s colonial legacy and the implication of ethnographers in what Anthony Kwame Harrison defines as the project of literatizing non-literate societies, I argue that the potentially scriptocentric dimension of ethnographic practice must be taken seriously in light of the travels of ethnography across disciplines and its increasingly widespread usage within qualitative inquiry. In the second part, I foreground philosopher Adriana Cavarero’s critique of the devocalization of logos in Western philosophy and its analysis by interdisciplinary voice studies scholar Konstantinos Thomaidis, who investigates the systematic exclusion, marginalization and silencing of voice through Eurocentric constructions of logos as reason and as language. By means of an imaginary visit to ancient Greece, I scrutinize Plato’s anxiety vis-à-vis performance through an ethnographic encounter with the Ion, a dialogue between Socrates and a well-known champion of rhapsodic contests. On the basis of this performative ethnographic fieldwork, I suggest that conducting qualitative research on the significance and relevance of vocality today requires listening to, engaging with, and learning from the voices of ancient and contemporary oral cultural practitioners.

This performative ethnography of Occitan cultural resurgence through the practice of traditional song and music is situated at the intersection of anthropology, ethnomusicology, sociology, and the interdisciplinary field of performance studies. Based on her fieldwork in Occitania as an artist-scholar, the author proposes a critical and reflexive approach that combines the imaginary with historicity and the legendary with the performative to question the future of an intercultural musical tradition which she associates with her Mediterranean roots. Aiming to produce what D. Soyini Madison (2012) calls a performance of possibilities, the author lets us see/read/imagine an Occitania revitalized by diversity, inclusion, and solidarity, thereby offering an alternative to nationalist constructions of cultural identity rooted in France’s colonialist legacy and to the disturbing resurgence of far-right movements in Europe.

Cette ethnographie performative de la résurgence culturelle occitane par la pratique du chant et de la musique traditionnels se situe à la croisée de l’anthropologie, l’ethnomusicologie, la sociologie, et le champ interdisciplinaire des performance studies. Nourri par le travail de terrain que l’auteur mène en Occitanie en tant qu’artiste-chercheur, cet article propose une démarche critique et réflexive alliant l’imaginaire à l’historicité et le légendaire au performatif pour interroger le devenir d’une tradition musicale interculturelle que l’auteur associe à ses racines méditerranéennes. Afin de produire ce que D. Soyini Madison (2012) nomme performance of possibilities [la performance des possibles], l’auteur donne à voir/lire/imaginer une Occitanie revitalisée par la diversité, l’inclusion et la solidarité afin d’offrir une alternative aux constructions nationalistes de l’identité culturelle ancrées dans l’héritage colonialiste de la France ainsi qu’à l’inquiétante recrudescence des mouvements d’extrême droite en Europe.

"Honoring Cultural Diversity through Collective Vocal Practice" is a SSHRC-funded project developed in close consultation with an Indigenous Advisory Committee composed of seven Indigenous artist-scholars and Elders / Traditional Knowledge Keepers, as well as two Indigenous and two non-Indigenous graduate students and a non-Indigenous artist-scholar. Together we have been exploring resonance as a practice of ritual engagement activated by the Indigenous ethical principles of relationality, reciprocity, respect, and responsibility. In 2016–17, we co-facilitated three gatherings / singing circles hosted in two Okanagan traditional winter homes and at the University of British Columbia First Nations Longhouse in Vancouver; two open workshops at Simon Fraser University and UBC’s Okanagan Campus; two performative presentations for the International Congress of Qualitative Inquiry at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and for the Canadian Association for Theatre Research / L’Association canadienne de la recherche théâtrale conference held in Toronto; as well as a three-day retreat/closed meeting in the Okanagan.

The resurgence of Occitan popular music traditions in France is
coterminous with the emergence of postcolonial regionalism during
the 1970s Larzac protests, following the wave of decolonization
in the 1960s and anticipating the anti-globalization movement in
subsequent decades. Situated within this continuum of postcolonial
and transnational cultural activism, Occitan music practitioners are
uniquely positioned to embody a radically inclusive conception of
Occitan identity by embracing the intercultural dimension of their
Mediterranean musical heritage. Reconciling regional specificity and
cultural hybridity can thus offer creative ways of resisting nationalist
constructions of identity and neoliberal representations of global
culture.

This essay examines the potentialities and limitations of the Anglo-American performance paradigm. It discusses the epistemological and methodological implications of the “performance turn” in the social sciences. It considers the Indigenous critique of dominant Western knowledge stems that support a form of cultural imperialism privileging binary thinking and mind-body dualism. The exploration of the strands of scholarship emphasizing the political dimension echoes Diana Taylor’s dual concepts of archive and repertoire, material traces and non-written performance, exposing the social and cultural biases behind the archive’s supposed neutrality.

... about whether or not it was ready to deliver a compelling enough theatre piece ... the ensemble, since all the right ingredients had been selected for the making of Interruptions ... the Lecoq-based direction, not to mention the presence of an established contemporary playwright sitting ...

At the opening of Gordon Craig's The Art Of The Theater (1912), the Stage-Director, who has just shown the Playgoer around the theater in order to give him an idea of the "machine" ("general construction, together with the stage, the machinery for manipulating the scenes, the ...

For a number of theater critics and scholars, the term "theatrical" still bears the imprint of Diderot's Paradox. 1 Consequently, criticism and research grounded in the French philosopher's conception of theater contribute to further widen the chasm between theory and practice, for Diderot's ...

"As both a scholar and a performer herself, Magnat’s research relies upon an interdisciplinary methodology, combining fieldwork, artistic collaboration with her subjects, and the articulation of her embodied research through writing. The result is an insightful account of the work of such artists as Rena Mirecka, Ewa Benesz, Katharina Seyferth, and Ang Gey Pin. This book will be a valuable resource for scholars interested in the work of Grotowski, Polish theatre, women theatre practitioners, as well as those engaged in practice-as-research." - Review by Tanya Dean, TDR

"[Magnat’s] methodology is an exquisite ethnographic balance of researcher and participant ... I found she did a splendid job of placing [this study] within the context of Polish history. …Her overall argument follows a post-theatrical path in Communist Poland instead of capitalizing on Grotowski’s international reputation…The volume is a comprehensive collection of the practising female Grotowski practitioners...This is a valuable body of work... the first to give full attention to the female angle of Grotowski’s legacy." - Review by Lara Szypszak, Canadian Theatre Review

"Influenced by the fields of indigenous and feminist research methodologies and her personal contact with Cree director, performer and writer Floyd Favel, Magnat lays out an approach that stresses the necessity of abandoning the position of a distanced, objective observer of cultural material... In bringing to light the work of these practitioners, Magnat also has the opportunity to further analyse the development of Grotowski’s Paratheatrical experiments – a period of his work that is often given only cursory or dismissive treatment in accounts that address the officially sanctioned direction of his work and successors….The book provides much interesting ethnographic detail and well-constructed arguments … Magnat is asking provocative and important questions, and offering access to a rich and fascinating realm of performance practice." - Review by Brian Schultis, Studies in Theatre and Performance

Recipient of the Canadian Association for Theatre Research 2014 Ann Saddlemyer Book Award Honorable Mention

"This book will be a valuable resource for scholars interested in the work of Grotowski, Polish theatre, women theatre practitioners, as well as those engaged in practice-as-research." - Review by Tanya Dean, TDR

"This is a valuable body of work... the first to give full attention to the female angle of Grotowski’s legacy." - Review by Lara Szypszak, Canadian Theatre Review

"Magnat is asking provocative and important questions, and offering access to a rich and fascinating realm of performance practice." - Review by Brian Schultis, Studies in Theatre and Performance

Watch the Companion Documentary Film Series on the Routledge Performance Archive (http://www.routledgeperformancearchive.com)