Browsing by Author "Banning, Yvonne"

Now showing 1 - 7 of 7
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    Breathing space : cross-community professional theatre as a means of dissolving fixed geographical landscapes
    (2005) Matchett, Sara; Banning, Yvonne
    In this paper, I investigate the idea of cross-community professional theatre as a means of dissolving fixed georgraphical landscapes. Key to this is the synergy between mainstream and community theatre, out of which this idea emerges. I explore how theatre facilitates conversations across differences. 'Differences' encompass questions of geographical, class and racial divides as well as the ideological differences between mainstream and community theatre. Cross-community professional theatre involves working with people from different communities around specific issues. Professional actors work alongside non-professional actors from communities to create a piece of theatre. Community members are involved in the process as well as in the performance. Cross-community refers not only to the exchange between professional actors and non-professional actors, but also to the idea of theatre providing a framework for conversations between different communities.
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    English language usage in South African Theatre since 1976
    (1989) Banning, Yvonne; Steadman, Ian
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    Inherited memories : performing the archive
    (2007) Davids, Nadia; Erasmus, Zimitri; Banning, Yvonne
    This thesis explores the way in which words, memories, and images of District Six are mediated and performed in an attempt to memorialised a destroyed urban landscape. It expands the borders of 'performance' to include oral (re)constructions of place by ex-residents, which in turn opens a space for a reflective analysis in which Marianne Hirsch’s psychodynamic theory of ‘postmemory’ is explored through the phrase ‘Children of District Six’. It traces the role and influence of ex-residents in shaping the politics and poetics of the District Six Museum and argues that orality and performance are singularly sympathetic in evoking and remembering the aesthetic, cultural, and political realms of District Six. It then shifts towards an analysis of two creative projects; Magnet Theater's Onnest’bo and the Museum’s Re-Imagining Carnival in which the themes of place, home, loss, exile, resistance, advocacy and restitution rotate around experiences of forced removals in general and District Six in particular. A thematic cord is created between these performance pieces and oral testimonies and their combined mediation of the many archives of District Six. Through an engagement with the performative odysseys and attendant archives of Re-Imagining Carnival and Onnest’bo the thesis examine metaphysical enactments of material loss, engages with tactics of re-construction of place and experience through memory, connects the psychic worlds of memory and performance and suggests an ideological flow between oral history, witnessing, and theatre. It is an exploration underpinned by the question of the role of performance in memorialising national narratives and the potential of creative mobilisations of memory in enacting psychic restitution. Both Onnest’bo and Re-Imagining Carnival are linked to the District Six Museum, and as such the Museum, its methodologies, ethics, ethos, and work with tangible and intangible heritage serve as an essential ideological foundation from which these creative visions emerge.
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    She is also playing; she is also wearing the mask that I am wearing :' investigating the gendered dynamics of implementing a forum theatre project for young women in Manenberg'
    (2007) Okech, Awino; Bennett, Jane; Banning, Yvonne
    This thesis examines the utilization of forum theatre techniques to explore the processes of gendering women within a workshop consisting of twenty-three young women in Manenberg, South Africa. It examines the opportunities that these techniques provide the group in uncovering, understanding and questioning the practices, norms and patterns that inform the construction of femininity. This thesis draws on theories of community theatre praxis in South Africa, gender and development discourse as well as research on contemporary 'rites of passage' practices in Manenberg. As a qualitative study embedded in feminist epistemology and feminist activism, this research utilises a range of methods, including participant observation, appreciative inquiry and second hand ethnography. There methods are used to critically analyse the opportunities and gaps that emerge when using forum theatre with this particular group. My positionality as a researcher and activist is engaged in this thesis as a critical site for reflection and analysis. This research establishes that forum theatre through specific activities provide the space for the exploration, analysis and comprehension of the gendered experiences of the young women in Manenberg. However there are methodological shortcomings, which are pointed out as areas for future research.
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    Subversive acts : the politics of the female subject in performance
    (1997) De Wet, Elizabeth; Banning, Yvonne
    This study analyses the role of theatrical discourse in the relationship between patriarchal ideology and gendered subjectivity. It explores ways in which theatre might be used to encourage the social transgression of patriarchal gender norms and investigates the problems associated with the practical realisation of these strategies for gender subversion. The study is structured in two parts. Part I lays the theoretical foundation of the discussion. It argues, in Chapter One, that the concept of gender identity as a natural, inherent facet of human nature is an ideological construct and that gender is not, therefore, an innate aspect of all human beings, but rather a learnt behaviour. In Chapter Two, the connection between the social and theatrical performances of gender is made and the role of theatre in teaching the social performance of gender is examined. Part I concludes with an exploration into possible strategies for gender subversion within the paradigm of theatre. Part II concentrates on the application of the theory discussed in Part I to the practice of theatre. Chapters Four and Five focus respectively on the author's experiences of producing and receiving performance texts from a gender-subversive perspective. In conclusion, this study argues that there are particular problems associated with attempting gender-subversion through theatrical performance texts, due to the extent to which patriarchal ideology is entrenched within the cultural practice of theatre. It also argues, however, that theatre offers unique potential for intervening in the interpellation of gendered subjects and as such, all attempts to use it to this end should be encouraged and supported.
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    Theatre of the contact zone : a quest for a means to nurse split psychic spaces in public spheres through the transformation of dramatic texts into performance texts
    (2007) Chimoga, Tichaona Ronald Kizito; Banning, Yvonne; Singer, Jacque; Pather, Jay
    This study is a theoretical explication of an idea of a theatre called Theatre of the Contact Zone. Its main feature is the collaboration between the playwright and the director in the transformation of dramatic texts into performance texts. Within the pragmatics of this theatre the playwright's initial task is to provide a working script. It is only a foundation, the basis, without which the director has nothing to begin coordinating the collaborative process of theatre making. The writing of the script continues through out rehearsals. The final script is compiled after the production incorporating changes made in the course of its transformation into a performance, as well as insights gained through watching the production. The first experiment was through a play called An African Syzygy which I wrote and was directed by Sanjin Muftic (a fellow postgraduate student whose orientation in theatre studies is directing).
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    Towards performing an afropolitan subjectivity
    (2008) Kabwe, Mwenya; Banning, Yvonne; Pather, Jay
    Emerging directly from three devised performances conducted as practical research projects in the exploration of my thesis, the production supported by this explication titled Afrocartography: Traces of Places and all points in between, (Afrocartography) is located within a series of works that explore an Afropolitan subject position. Towards the goal of articulating a theatrical form, style and aesthetic of this so called Afropolitan experience, the first section of this paper serves to locate the term Afropolitan within a personal contextual frame from which the paper progresses.