Fwd: CFP -- CATR Curated Panel: "Another Kind of Work: Cultural Capital, Performance, and LGBTQ Communities"

[Paul Halferty]

*Dear CanDrama Colleagues:*

*Please find below a CFP for a curated panel at this year's CATR
conference. Please distribute widely. *

Canadian Association for Theatre Research / Association Canadienne de la
Recherche Théâtrale Conference
May 30th – June 2nd University of Ottawa


*Another Kind of Work: Cultural Capital, Performance, and LGBTQ Communities*



*Coordinators:* J. Paul Halferty (University College Dublin)

and Stephen Low (Cornell University)


*Due date: Jan.15, 2015*



In Jenny Livingston’s documentary film, *Paris is Burning*, an MC
commenting on the performance of a contestant in the category “Town and
Country” proclaims, “O-P-U-L-E-N-C-E! OPULENCE! You own everything!
Everything is yours!” The irony of the statement is that most of the queer
African-American and Latino people, who produce and participate in the drag
balls that are the subject of Livingston’s film, are economically and
culturally marginalized. The “ball children,” as they are called, “own”
very little as they have been systemically disadvantaged within a racist,
misogynist, trans- and homophobic society. And yet, within the subcultural
world of the ball forms of capital and modes of exchange, meaning, and
value are enacted, performed, and *owned*. In addition to the tangible
trophies that participants can win, forms of celebrity, of being
“legendary,” particular skills, talents, and knowledge are accrued and
exploited. Indeed, the film itself participates (not unproblematically) in
these processes.



Since before Stonewall and the era of gay liberation and civil rights, LGBTQ
individuals have established unique modes of non-monetary forms of
exchange. These practices continue in current moment, when queers are
increasingly visible in all areas of society, and often associated with
particular talents, proclivities, and forms of cultural knowledge. Inspired
by these diverse queer cultural practices, and Pierre Bourdieu’s theory of
“cultural capital,” this curated panel invites papers that address how LGBTQ
theatres and performances function as modes through which various forms of
cultural capital are enacted, accumulated, exchanged, and exploited. Taking
queer practices and the concept of “cultural capital” as a point of
departure, this panel asks:



-          How does cultural capital function within LGBTQ communities,
especially through theatre and performance practices?

-          How do LGBTQ individuals exploit various forms of cultural
capital in normative, late-capitalist societies?

-          How has the cultural capital of theater and performance
increased, decreased, and/or shifted the cultural capital of LGBTQ
communities over time?

-          Or to frame it in the terms of the conference theme, “Capital
Ideas,” how have *ideas* about who queers are been performatively effected
and how do these relate to discourses of cultural capital?

-          How has the rise of queer theory affected forms of academic
capital and performance?



Interested parties please email a 250-word paper proposal and 150-word bio
to J. Paul Halferty (paul.halferty at ucd.ie <paulhalferty at gmail.com>) and
Stephen Low (low.stephen82 at gmail.com) by January 15th 2015.





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