More Books

Brown Boys and Rice Queens: Spellbinding Performance in the Asias. By Eng-Beng Lim. New York: New York University Press, 2014; 256 pp.; illustrations. $71.10 cloth, $26.00 paper.

In this passionate investigation, Lim explores the Western trope of the Asian “brown boy” — childlike, effeminate, silent — focusing on its presence in performance and drawing parallels between white male dominance of “brown boys” and Western dominance of Asia. Unlike the white man-brown girl/woman dyad, the male-male sexual relationship has gone largely unexplored by scholars; Lim redresses this not only with purposeful attention to the eroticized “brown boy,” but also by locating the trope’s manifestation across decades and continents. Beginning in colonial Bali, Lim examines the kecak dance and its branding as an “authentic” religious ritual by Western tourism (and sometimes scholarship), while these same institutions ignore the influence of German expatriate artist Walter Spies on kecak’s formation, as well as Spies’s allegedly exploitative relationships with Balinese men. The following chapters explore Anglophone queer theatre in Singapore (produced by and for locals) and the performance of the passive “brown boy” by diasporic populations in their daily lives. Both phenomena, he says, simultaneously draw upon Western-influenced empowerment of queer lifestyles and cater to a white colonial fantasy. The far-reaching insidiousness of the trope becomes evident in Lim’s careful detailing of his subjects’ lives, from sex to psychology to consumerism.

City Choreographer: Lawrence Halprin in Urban Renewal America. By Alison Bick Hirsch. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2014; 320 pp.; illustrations. $30.00 paper.

This lovingly compiled look into the urban design of landscape architect Lawrence Halprin and his “RSVP” (Resource, Score, Valuaction, Performance) method offers biographical information on Halprin and his wife, choreographer Anna Halprin, and outlines the implementation of design plans for public spaces in Fort Worth, TX; Seattle, WA; Minneapolis, MN; Portland, OR; and other cities throughout the 1960s and ’70s. Hirsch highlights Halprin’s Bauhaus background and his interest in the socially conscious habitability of a space, despite more recent criticism of some of his architecture as outmoded brutalism. In order to ensure the social usefulness and flexibility of his designs, Halprin incorporated Anna Halprin’s choreographic method of “scoring” into his process, which invited the public to explore and offer impressions of public spaces before building began. The study concludes with case studies of RSVP in action, with illustrations, maps, and workshop plans. Hirsch argues that Halprin’s methods, rather than his built structures, should be his legacy, though she does not shy away from discussing his more controversial practices, such as scores that allegedly led participants to a predetermined design.

Philosophizing Rock Performance: Dylan, Hendrix, Bowie. By Wade Hollingshaus. Plymouth, UK: Scarecrow Press, 2013; 204 pp. $58.50 cloth.

Tackling the irresistibly cool Bob Dylan, Jimi Hendrix, and David Bowie, Hollingshaus uses the theories of Jean-François Lyotard, Michel de Certeau, Guy Debord, Jacques Rancière, and others to create an “anti-Establishment” narrative of these artists’ performance practices, while also acknowledging his own position as a member of the “Establishment.” First, placing Dylan’s work within Lyotard’s concept of the mutic gesture, Hollingshaus reconciles the artist’s refusal to align with a political movement with the political bent of many of his lyrics, pinpointing Dylan’s “gone electric” appearance at the 1965 Newport Folk Festival as a defining moment. In the Hendrix chapter, Hollingshaus applies de Certeau’s concept of...