Advances In Social Performance Theory

Theorising society as a stage on which actors perform meanings has long served as an illuminating metaphor in the social sciences. Yet many central questions in this area remain unanswered. What exactly is social performance, and where do its boundaries lie? How does social performance differ from more familiar and well-studied modes of performance such as those we find on stage or screen? In what ways do these different modes of performing rely upon and draw from one another? Is ‘performance’ simply a productive metaphor when applied to social interaction, or should it be taken in a more literal sense? What is the role of the audience in social performance, and does this differ from the audience’s role in artistic performance? What role do emotions play in the enactment and reception of social performances? How does charisma feature in social drama? How have new media affected the transmission of meaning via performance? This session invites papers aimed at answering questions such as these. We welcome both theoretical proposals and empirical applications of performance theory, but for the latter, our focus will be on how such empirical applications can help us advance conceptual development in this area.