Pacific Performances: Theatricality and Cross-Cultural Encounter in the South Seas

Incorporating the very latest approaches to performance studies, this new study by Christopher Balme explores the history of cross-cultural performative encounters in the Pacific from the eighteenth-century to the present. Using the concept of theatricality, it examines both the performance cultures of Pacific peoples as they negotiated the colonial situation and Western theatrical representations. The material investigated ranges from eighteenth-century pantomimes to Broadway plays and musicals; ethnographic spectacles and colonial ceremonies rub shoulders with contemporary tourist theme parks and Samoan stand-up comedy.