Theatre Journal Special Issues Call for Papers for 2022
Call for Papers
Special Issue for September 2022: Installation
“More than any other artwork, installation requires the actual presence of the spectator. . . . this artistic practice is essentially a sensorial experience that the entire body is supposed to encounter.” - Itzhak Goldberg, Installations (2019)
How do we theorize installation through performance and vice versa? Various genealogies of installation art trace its origins to European modernism (e.g., futurism) or mid-century American experimentation (e.g., Allan Kaprow), but we might trace installation more broadly across
architecture, biennials, galleries, museums, protests, public art projects, world expositions, and more. From the polka dots of Yayoi Kusama to the machines of Kris Verdonck to the nightclubs of the duo that comprise FAKA (Fela Gucci and Desire Marea), installations complicate ostensible divisions between subject and object. They raise questions not only about what we perceive but also how.
Installation usually connotes transience; the temporality of installations frequently evokes political questions. Here we might think of the controversial work of Brett Bailey. Beyond particular artworks, the Strike MOMA campaign has led to consideration of New York’s Museum of Modern Art as a large-scale installation that signifies and furthers “colonial-capitalist modernity.” What happens when installations endure?
Acknowledging that Theatre Journal has explored different aspects of art, display, museums, and visuality in relation to theatre, this issue aims both to broaden and to deepen these discussions. Contributors might consider other facets of the normative or non-normative human (or non-human) sensorium in relation to space. Essays historicizing and/or theorizing installation in different contexts are welcome.
This special issue will be edited by Theatre Journal editor Sean Metzger. We will consider both full length essays for the print edition (6,000-9,000 words) as well as proposals for short provocations, video and/or photo essays, and other creative, multimedia material for our on-line platform (500-2,000 words). For information about submission, visit: https://jhuptheatre.org/theatre-journal/author-guidelines
Submissions for the print journal (6,000-9,000 words) and for the online platform (500-2,000 words) should reach us no later than 1 December 2021.
Submit via ScholarOne:
https://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/theatrejournal
Feel free to contact the editors with questions or inquiries:
Sean Metzger, Editor at smetzger@tft.ucla.edu
Carla Neuss, Online Editor at carla.neuss@yale.edu
Call for Papers
Special Issue for December 2021: Pathologies & Performance
As we mourn our losses, grapple with harsh inequities exposed and exacerbated by the Covid-19 pandemic, and yearn for a post-Covid moment that might never arrive, Theatre Journal calls for essays that explore the intersection of performance and pathology. This special issue seeks to contribute to an anticipated wave of interdisciplinary scholarship that rejects the instrumentalization of the arts reflected in the medical humanities and instead delves into the profound social and political imbrications of medicine, disease, and illness in the context of the visual, literary, and performing arts.
This issue seeks to build upon the significant work that theatre and performance studies scholars have already accomplished, yielding generative terms such as the “medical body,” “embodied pathographies,” and “dramatist-as-pathologist.” The framework of pathology is meant to invoke not only its most common definition—the medical study of diseases—but also its more expansive etymology. Pathology comes from the Greek word pathología, meaning the study of suffering, and thus speaks to how illness and disease intersect with passion, affect, and lifeworlds. The term is also meant to invoke the visceral impact of pathogens as a life force, as Patrick Anderson has movingly addressed.
Illness disables and debilitates bodies, and thus a critical framework of pathology owes a considerable intellectual debt to disability studies. In the landmark anthology Bodies in Commotion, Carrie Sandahl and Phil Auslander emphasize the violence that medical models have wreaked on nonnormative bodies, noting that disability studies aim at “peeling away the label of pathology with its comcomitant demand for cure.” Indeed, a central aim of disability studies is to depathologize individuals and communities. But in recognition of our hyper- medicalized moment, this issue shifts focus to pathology and seeks to consider what medical models have to offer theatre and performance beyond violence and harm—while recognizing that the violence continues apace particularly upon Black female and trans* bodies.
In the wake of the “converging pandemics” of Covid-19 and anti-Blackness, the time is more than ripe for new conceptualizations that contend with the expansiveness and porosity of what Susan Sontag famously called the “kingdom of the sick.” How might frameworks of pathology, illness, and/or disease revitalize expand our understandings of performance? How might a focus on illness confront the insidiousness of structural forms of violence and the necropolitics of “letting die”? How might the seepage of infectious disease across borders impact our understandings of transnational theatre history? In addition to the silencing force of pathogens in relation to the shutdown of commercial theatre—from early modern London to Broadway in 2020—how might we conceptualize illness and disease as a generative, creative force? Theatre Journal encourages a wide range of essays that explore the performance of pathology and/or the pathologies of performance. We especially invite analyses that are attuned to processes of pathologization and how those processes have been understood and iterated differently across historical eras and geographies.
This special issue will be edited by Theatre Journal co-editor Laura Edmondson, who welcomes inquiries regarding potential submissions at Laura.Edmondson@dartmouth.edu. We will consider both full length essays for the print edition (6,000-9,000 words) as well as proposals for short provocations, video and/or photo essays, and other creative, multimedia material for our on-line platform (500-2,000 words). For information about submission, visit: https://jhuptheatre.org/theatre-journal/author-guidelines
Submissions for the print journal (6,000-9,000 words) and for the online platform (500-2,000 words) should reach us no later than February 1, 2022
Submit via ScholarOne:
https://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/theatrejournal
Feel free to contact the editors with questions or inquiries:
Sean Metzger, Editor at smetzger@tft.ucla.edu
Carla Neuss, Online Editor at carla.neuss@yale.edu
Submissions are always welcome for the journal’s general issues.
Submission FAQs
1. How often can I publish an essay in Theatre Journal?
An author may be published in the journal no more frequently than once every two years.
2. Can I have an essay published in Theatre Topics in the same year as Theatre Journal?
While the two journals are independent, it is best to space submissions to them so that essays by the same person are not appearing in the two journals at the same time.
3. If my essay is rejected by Theatre Journal when can I try to submit another essay to Theatre Journal?
An author must wait a year before submitting a subsequent essay to Theatre Journal.
4. My essay is about a single production. Will this affect its chances of being accepted?
Yes: Theatre Journal tends not to publish essays on a single play or production. Exceptions are occasionally made when essays explore a very broad and well-contextualized understanding of a moment or an aspect of performance or when the assessment of a single production is a springboard to a larger argument.
5. My essay is about a single play. It is a deep and thorough reading of that play. Would Theatre Journal be interested in that?
As with the answer to the question above, Theatre Journal tends not to publish essays on a single play unless they use that exploration to reinterpret the play or the author’s oeuvre, etc. Such an essay would need to demonstrate a very thorough knowledge of the ways in which the play has been read to that point.
6. My essay doesn’t deal very much with theatricality or performance. Will this be a problem?
Theatre Journal is interested in performance aspects first and foremost so it is very important that essays engage with theatricality.
7. My essay is very historically focused. Is it true that Theatre Journal privileges contemporary work?
Theatre Journal publishes the best essays relating to theatre and performance, regardless of era. Historical essays that are not accepted may deal with a specific moment in time without any indication of how that moment matters to a broad theatre readership.
8. Do I need to send in an abstract to get the editors’ approval before submitting an essay?
No, please do not submit an abstract: we prefer to read the full essay and make an assessment on that basis. If your essay is accepted, we will ask for an abstract then.
9. How many images can I expect to include in an accepted essay?
We can publish roughly five images per essay, but images are not essential. We urge authors to include only high quality images that contribute to the essay’s argument.
In some instances, depending on the topic, more images may be necessary and we deal with such matters on a case by case basis. The online platform can support images that are not able to be included in the print version. This platform can also support other forms of illustration/supporting material. Any images there are in color, while images in the print version are black and white.
As ever, it is the author’s responsibility to secure the high-quality images, the permissions, and to pay any cost for them.
10. How many images can I expect to include in an accepted performance review?
There is a maximum of two images per performance review, unless the review covers a festival.
As with essays, it may be possible for additional images to be uploaded to the online platform.
11. How often can I write a performance/book review?
An author can contribute one performance review and one book review per calendar year.
12. How often do the roles of Co-Editor, Editor, Online Editor and Book/Performance Review Editors turn over?
The Co-Editor has a two year term, followed by two years as Editor (four years total). The Online, Book and Performance Reviews Editors have three year terms. Calls for applications for these positions appear through ATHE approximately 6 months before the previous terms expire.
13. What is the function of the online platform?
The online platform extends the print journal and provides an exciting space for creative research that engages with multimedia and digital opportunities, such as video and photo essays, podcasts, documentaries, rehearsal footage, video interviews, etc. It is also a space where we can publish supplementary material that can’t be contained between the print covers (charts, extra illustrations, video clips, podcasts, etc). Through the online platform, the Editors can also communicate with readers about news from the team and from the field.
14. Can I propose to edit or co-edit a special issue of Theatre Journal?
While Theatre Journal has two special issues per year, the Co-Editor and Editor edit these. The journal doesn’t normally bring on guest editors. If you have a topic that you feel the journal should consider, please speak to one of the editors.
15. How can I have my say?
Please speak to one of the editors either at a conference or via email:
E. J. Westlake: ej.westlake.theatrejournal@gmail.com
Sean Metzger: smetzger@tft.ucla.edu