Steve Tillis - The Challenge of World Theatre History

Steve Tillis

The Challenge of World Theatre History

1st ed. 2020

The present volume is an important landmark in Prof. Tillis tireless efforts to make the theatre history curriculum more inclusive. Through a series of eight enlightening chapters, Prof. Tillis introduces the reader to the problems with the Standard Western Approach to theatre history. We learn from these discussions that not only does this approach present a skewed historiography of understanding theatre but that it also limits the scope of our discipline. He subsequently inaugurates avenues that would allow one to circumvent these trappings and create curriculums that truly address the vast breadth of our discipline without resorting to essentialist tactics. Without pontificating Tillis introduces readers to the major historiographical forces to have impacted the evolution of performance and suggests that a truly global curriculum centers around those forces rather than arbitrary geographies and artificial temporal markers. The volume is a must-read for both emerging and established theatre historians, and theatre history teachers. I hope we will take inspiration from Prof. Tillis yeoman work and will continue to revise our curriculums to eventually teach a true history of World Theatre.

Arnab Banerji, PhD, Asst. Prof. of Theatre History, Loyola Marymount University, Los Angeles, USA

As the culture in general and theatre specifically has become increasingly globalized, the traditional Eurocentric and teleological orientation of Western theatre studies has become more and more untenable. In this groundbreaking new work, Steve Tillis impressively confronts this situation, explaining in detail the reasons why the traditional system is no longer satisfactory and presenting a variety of convincing strategies for developing the new global perspective for this discipline which the evolving new order demands.

Marvin Carlson, Sidney E. Cohn Distinguished Professor of Theatre, Comparative Literature, and Middle Eastern Studies, Graduate Centre, CUNY, USA

Many of us teaching and working in theatre desire an approach that is more globalbut lack the tools to really think about world theatre history. In this innovative, and accessible, study Tillis both informs readers about global theatre history and engages critical thinking about the very process of history-making. A must read for anyone teaching or making theatre. Inspirational and necessary!

Jennifer Goodlander, Associate Professor, Department of Comparative Literature, Indiana University, USA

This is a book that carefully considers the implications of current research and pedagogy in the problematic and problematically underdeveloped area of theatre studies and theatre history from around the world. Tilliss careful delineation of terms and basic units of analysis provide a flexible but impeccably organized system in which and against which scholars and artists can develop strategies to conceptualize a wide array of theatrical practices. The welcome clarity of the writing makes this book as suitable for the classroom as the researchers reference shelf. The fluency and passion with which Tillis moves around the globe and between the disciplines of history, theatre studies, comparative literature, and human geography challenges the reader to perpetually expand conceptionsnot only of theatre historybut of the intellectual duties of a scholar.

Glen Odom, Reader, University of Roehampton, UK

Tillis challenges the assumptions upon which world theatre history, and indeed theatre history in general, are constructed, in a compelling and clear examination of the preconceptions that have shaped the discipline so far. The different sections on fallacies, geography, and periodization, reveal the politics, trends, and logic of the debate over how to best approach the teaching of world theatre history. The Challenge of World Theatre History makes an important and thoughtful contribution to the field of theatre history studies.

E.J. Westlake, Professor of Theatre and Professor of English, University of Michigan, USA

Tillis offers an important and provocative historiography of approaches to how theatre history is taught. For years textbooks have paid lip service to presenting a more globalized approach to dramatic literature and theatre history while remaining firmly focused on the west. The Challenge of World Theatre History offers a path forward, moving the center of our theatrical maps, and helping us think about how we think about theatre. It belongs on the shelf of every theatre student and teacher.

Kevin J. Wetmore, Jr., PhD, Professor and Chair, Theatre Arts, Loyola Marymount University, USA

To my wife, Adrienne Baker