-
6 Intercultural Collaborations
- University of Minnesota Press
- Chapter
- Additional Information
117 SIX INTERCULTURAL COLLABORATIONS American theater is the natural space for a society no longer able to keep its fictional fences standing. It is a space of creative energy that is a shelter where people try to understand a world in which we are all materially, spiritually, elbow-to-elbow, interdependent. —Thulani Davis, “Theatre beyond Borders” Penumbra Theatre Company illuminates the human condition from the prism of African American experiences.1 This does not mean, however, that the theatre fails to participate in crosscultural or global conversations. In the late 1990s and first decade of the twenty-first century, Penumbra produced several plays that explored the increasing interdependence of people from various cultural backgrounds, races, and nationalities. As a culturally specific theatre, the intercultural work that Penumbra has produced is grounded in the specific cultural backgrounds and histories of the artists with whom the theatre has worked. These collaborations show how an African American theatre company can contribute to cultural pluralism in a multiethnic society in an engaged and socially responsible manner. I believe that intercultural theatre is best practiced when it is collaborative and when each participant approaches the collaboration from the perspective of their own cultural background and lineage. I use the term intercultural rather than multicultural because the latter term has frequently been applied to theatre productions in which there has been some level of cultural appropriation. Theatre productions that have been accused of practicing unethical forms of multiculturalism include Peter Brook’s production of The Mahabharata and the more recent production of The Syringa Tree by Pamela Gien.2 118 INTERCULTURAL COLLABORATIONS Despite these productions’ claims of promoting multicultural understanding and appreciation, both plays place white individuals or white institutions as the arbiters of intercultural exchange, thereby reinforcing historic and oppressive racial hierarchies and fetishizing Indian and South African people and cultures, respectively. The practice of a certain kind of “happy multiculturalism” is problematic because it purportedly celebrates cultural difference but does so in an extremely shallow way, often suggesting that cultural differences are a matter of style or taste and either obfuscating or ignoring the continued existence of racially based social inequalities .3 In Liberalism, Neoliberalism, and Social Democracy Mark Olssen states that more ethical practices of multiculturalism reject the universalism of classic liberalism as insufficient for the realization of an egalitarian democracy made up of diverse cultural groups. Olssen says: Multiculturalists argue that basic rights and fundamental freedoms—of religion, expression, thought, association, and participation—are necessary but not sufficient ingredients for an inclusive polity. Liberalism, they say, is inegalitarian in its consequences . In applying the same standard to all it pays insufficient attention to cultural politics of difference that would include all in full citizenship. In such a model, citizenship is reduced to private choices and individual preferences.4 I will refer to the theatrical work that I see as collaborative and invested in acknowledging the politics of cultural difference as intercultural rather than multicultural despite Olssen’s and other political theorists’ reclamation of that word. To articulate the precise nature of Penumbra’s contribution to American cultural pluralism, in this chapter I examine two different forms of intercultural collaboration. In the first section, I look at plays produced by Penumbra that depict cultural exchange between African Americans and other racial minorities. Two of these plays, Buffalo Hair and Grandchildren of the Buffalo Soldiers, examine historic and contemporary relationships between African American and Native American communities and individuals. Slippery When Wet focuses on an interracial relationship between a young Asian American woman and an African American man, theatrically de- [3.80.155.163] Project MUSE (2024-03-29 10:11 GMT) INTERCULTURAL COLLABORATIONS 119 constructing the racial stereotypes each character projects upon the other. While it is important for oppressed cultural groups to have works that celebrate and express racial and cultural pride, it is equally important to have theatre and literature that reveal historic culpability and promote cultural accountability. All three of the plays discussed in this first section delve into the specific racial politics of their subject matter in a way that moves beyond an oppressor/oppressed binary . Each production investigates the legacy of racism and racial formation in the United States, staging moments of collaboration, understanding, misunderstanding, and sometimes hostility between African Americans and other peoples of color. In this respect, these productions move beyond a surface multiculturalism that celebrates difference in a way that often masks the continued experience of racial oppression. Penumbra’s staging of these plays reveals...