Princeton University: Cultural Encounters in Heterotopia by Alexa Alice Joubin

How do we analyze diverse and polyphonic performances around the world with an eye towards equity and social justice? Alexa Alice Joubin's lecture at Princeton University outlines new methodologies for the study of adaptations.

The notion of heterotopia—a concept, proposed by Michel Foucault--describes worlds within worlds, or cultural spaces that are transformative because of their contradictory or trans-historical ideologies. Heterotopia, created by the craft of world-making, anchors and enables characters’ transformative experiences and self-discovery.

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00:10 Keulemans introduced Joubin
04:53 Cultural encounters
05:32 Locality in dramatic criticism
08:38 Heterotopia: Foucault
11:24 Heterotopia: Joubin
12:50 Heterotopia: theatre and cinema
13:27 Case study: Makibefo, Alexander Abela
16:35 Case study: Hamlet, Yukio Ninagawa
26:23 Case study: Chicken Rice War
30:14 Case study: Romeo + Juliet, Baz Luhrmann
31:18 Clip: Chicken Rice War
38:15 Case study: One Husband Too Many
40:13 Clip: One Husband Too Many, play within a film
42:49 Clip: One Husband Too Many, storming the stage
43:14 Deep connections
43:44 Making the strange familiar, the familiar strange
47:41 Conclusion (quote from Minae Mizumura)

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Drawing on Alexa Alice Joubin’s new and forthcoming books, Contemporary Readings in Global Performances of Shakespeare (2024) as well as Shakespeare and East Asia (2021), her lecture examines select Sinophone, Japanese, and Korean adaptations as heterotopia. Heterotopia, as a parallel space that contains and evokes other spaces, exists in reality (such as a theatre stage) and holds up a mirror to other realities. As heterotopia, global Shakespeare performances make the place that audiences occupy both distinct from the dramatic space and connected with the other worlds contained within and alluded to by the performance.

The event was organized and chaired by Paize Keulemans at Princeton University on April 26, 2024.