Nation and Ethnicity in Asian Theater and Performance
Nation and Ethnicity in Asian Theater and Performance
- Kevin J. Wetmore Jr.Kevin J. Wetmore Jr.Loyola Marymount University
Summary
Theater and performance are powerful tools for definition of national and ethnic identity. Nation, nationalism, ethnicity and identity are all unstable terms and concepts. In the 17th through the 20th centuries, there occurred a fundamental imposition of Western culture onto already-existent Asian cultures. Much of contemporary Asian nations and cultures saw their original, precolonial forms shaped and transformed first by colonialism, then by war, and finally by a postcolonial period starting in the postwar period through the early 21st century. In the wake of imperialism and colonialism, a number of Asian nations and cultures have used indigenous arts to reassert an unbroken sense of national or ethnic identity, rejecting Western models of theater while simultaneously embracing Western modes of performance and critique. Often, modern Asian nations would either invent traditions or move a tradition out of its original context in order to reimagine that tradition for the entire nation. National identity versus ethnic identity versus cultural identity, which can be the same or completely mutually exclusive within a community or individual, varies depending on the ethnic construction of the state and the nation. The theater thus both shapes national understanding of identities and, in turn, is shaped by it. Models for understanding nation, ethnicity, and identity can be found by examining individual case studies: the Japanese sense of the Japanese and the Other who lives in Japan (specifically Zainichi or Korean Japanese); the separate national identities of the two Koreas, which also shapes and is shaped by their individual sense of ethnic identity; the multicultural, multinational, and multiethnic nature of Singaporean society; and the Asian diaspora creating new variants on national and ethnic identity. Theater can both construct or challenge national identities, and it can also be exploited to assert a specific identity in the service of the nation-state or dominant ethnic group. Globalization and technology also challenge and reinforce ideas of nation, culture, and ethnicity.
Subjects
- Theater and Drama