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Marketing Trauma and the Theatre of War in Northern Uganda
- Theatre Journal
- Johns Hopkins University Press
- Volume 57, Number 3, October 2005
- pp. 451-474
- 10.1353/tj.2005.0098
- Article
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This essay explores the ways in which theatre and performance are used to market trauma and humanitarianism in northern Uganda, where a civil war has been waging between the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) and the Ugandan government since the late 1980s. Specifically, the article focuses on the dynamics of performance in a rehabilitation center for former child soldiers sponsored by World Vision. I draw upon my observations and personal experiences at the center to suggest that drama is valued primarily as a marketing tool to reach international and national audiences. In addressing specific variations upon the narrative of war, however, I find that theoretical frameworks of globalization and marketing do not satisfactorily explain the fierce investment in a linear story and the trappings of realism. The final section argues that former LRA captives use indigenous dances to carve out a space in which cultural memory and globalization intersect.