Bodies Out of Place: Performance, Space, Gender and Transgression in Contemporary Iran
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Zavarei, Saba. 2023. Bodies Out of Place: Performance, Space, Gender and Transgression in Contemporary Iran. Doctoral thesis, Goldsmiths, University of London [Thesis]
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Text (Bodies Out of Place: Performance, Space, Gender and Transgression in Contemporary Iran)
TAP_thesis_ZavareiS_2023.pdf - Accepted Version Available under License Creative Commons Attribution Non-commercial No Derivatives. Download (4MB) | Preview |
Abstract or Description
Over the past eight years my Practice Research has focused on examining the relationship between space and gender through the lens of performance studies. In several performance intervention pieces, as well as via reflective texts, I have analysed how women in Iran, through the transgressive performance of everyday life, create alternative spaces, in ways that challenge the hegemonic religious and patriarchal norms and regulations.
I have written a book called Ravayat-ha-ye Khiaban (Farsi-language publication, Stories of the Street); edited two essay collections, namely a special issue of Field (a journal of socially-engaged art criticism) on art and activism in Iran, and a special issue of the Farsi academic journal Spectrum on gender and public spaces; written many articles in Farsi and English including three peer-reviewed papers, given many invited talks and interviews; held many workshops on the topic of transgressive performance in gender-normative space; and have a produced a podcast of twelve half-hour episodes which I have curated into an online series, Radio Khiaban.
In bringing this considerable body of work together, my PhD reflective thesis argues that the importance and impact of my, and other artists’ transgressive performance contribute to the production of lived space through their integration of the virtual into the real. Transgression here means ‘crossing a line’, which takes place when someone is judged to be or acts ‘out-of-place’, behaving in a way that is not considered appropriate or expected according to the norms (Cresswell, 2004: 103). My transgressive performances and those of other female artists in Iran, whether they involve lying down and resting in public places in a country where women’s bodies are relegated to indoor, private, hidden seclusion; or singing or dancing, again in public, under a regime that bans women from such public displays… constitute more than merely the ephemerality of performance. Rather, they have the capacity to become more sustainable instances of contestation, by intervening in the everyday lives of both the performers, and the audience members who pass by. Through these acts of resistance and transgression, women in Iran create spaces to practise their equal share of society and exercise their equal rights to their bodies.
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Item Type: |
Thesis (Doctoral) |
| Identification Number (DOI): |
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| Keywords: |
Performance, Iran, Contemporary Iran, Iranian women, Gender and Performance, Transgression, Feminist Intervention, Gender and Space, Everyday space, Public space, Feminist geography |
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| Date: |
31 May 2023 |
| Item ID: |
33675 |
| Date Deposited: |
03 Jul 2023 14:00 |
| Last Modified: |
03 Jul 2023 18:00 |
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URI: |
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