Performance

Meaning of the term perform, performer and performance in the performing arts and media

While it is related to, encompassing of and/or part of what has traditionally been termed Theatre or Drama, Performance is used in a number of other specific ways.

Its use is varied in South Africa (and hence in this encyclopaedia), and not all the uses are related to theatre. One of the most common is the use of it as an indication of efficiency or achievement (e.g in engineering, sport, business, etc). Below we list three uses specifically related to theatre.

An act of performing

The original basic and familiar theatrical use of the term perform and performing – and the sense in which it is employed in this work therefore - is a reference to the activity of performing as a performer (or actor) on stage, in a performance space or venue. E.g. "He gave a good performance as Hamlet", he performed a Zulu dance.

A particular production

A second, equally conventional use of the term refers to a particular presentation of a work of theatre before a particular audience. (E.g. “We went to see a performance of Hamlet.”) This would be a reference to one specific production of a play or show by a given set of performers, at a given time, place and in a given venue. (A series of such performances by the same group of performances would be referred to as a production of the play – see below).

A theatrical event

A third meaning, which has become prominent during the second half of this century, derives from Victor Turner and Richard Schechner’s important and influential writings about what they term performance theory. They use the term to refer to something much larger and more encompassing than the second meaning of "performance" described above. It points to the entire event (also referred to as a theatrical event by some researchers) , i.e. the sum of all the processes involved in performing before an audience (including social, political, contextual, performative, ritual and ceremonial acts leading to and shaping the actual performance on stage, as well as its reception during and after the event. This would naturally also include many performance forms that may seem unconventional in European thinking about theatre forms.

Performance culture

A general term utilized by Loren Kruger (1999) (et al ***???) to refer to all forms of performance, beyond the narrower defintions of theatre (or even the entertainment industry and showbusiness), within a given society. More specifically it is often used to refer to non-literary performances and performance forms, not linked to (published/written) texts.

Performance spaces

This is a broader concept than theatres or stages

Performance Theory and Performance Studies

This refers to a theory of theatrical perfromance developed by Richard Schechner and Victor Turner, which expanded the idea of theatre beyond the formal stage. It is a theory embedded in what has coem to be called Performance Studies. The term perforrmance studies became current in the USA in the 1970s, and reached South Africa in the early 1980s with the writings of individuals such as Peter Larlham and David Coplan. By the end of the 1980s it had become quite a common term, and was widely adopted by writers, academics, research centres and departments of drama and performance studies.

For more on Performance Theory and Performance Studies, see Wikipedia at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Performance_studies and Performance Studies International at http://psi-web.org/

For more information

See also Theatre and performance research in South Africa

See also Drama, Play, Theatre, Theatrical event, Theatrical system.

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