Theater without Borders? Humanitarianism and Representation from Aid Networks to the Théâtre du Soleil

A lecture by Dr. Emine Fisek ‘03

Tuesday, April 3rd, 4:30 pm

301 LPAC

Over the course of the last decade, French theater has witnessed a wide variety of commercial and non-commercial works that portray narratives of exile, displacement, and suffering from undocumented immigrants, refugees and asylum seekers. In this talk my goal will be to place this emergence within the larger context of changing immigration laws, medical humanitarianisms and immigrant social movements. The representative practices of these domains increasingly influence both how artists think about the capacities they attribute to “humanitarian” art, and the explanatory principles they use to position themselves in relation to the suffering they wish to portray. What then does a humanitarian theater, “without borders”, look like?

Emine Fisek ’03 is currently a Mellon Post-Doctoral Fellow in French Literature/Francophone Studies at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore.  She has completed an M.A. and Ph.D. in the Department of Theater, Dance & Performance Studies at UC-Berkeley.  She will join the faculty of Western Languages and Literatures at Bogazici University in Istanbul in Fall 2012.  At Swarthmore, Dr. Fisek was a double major in Theater and English Literature.

Emine Fisek’s lecture is co-sponsored by the Lang Center for Civic & Social Responsibility, the Department of Modern Languages & Literatures (Arabic and French Sections), English Literature, and Film & Media Studies.