In this interview taken in May 2012 at New York University, André Lepecki offers a unique perspective on the development of Performance Studies at NYU. Being in fact the only current member of the department who has been first a Master and a PhD student, and later a professor in the same department, Lepecki has a first-hand and multifaceted view of the hallmarks of the New York tradition of Performance Studies, and of the changes that have characterized them during the past twenty years. Arrived at New York University in the early nineties, with a background primarily in anthropology and dance, here Lepecki familiarized with philosophy, performing art and "critical theory". Analyzing the history of Performance Studies at NYU, Lepecki identifies three key stages or moments: the "epic" moment, the moment of the "signature", and the moment of the "corporations". Furthermore he recognizes in the present leanings a greater focus on "critical theory", but also on "American Studies", which, with the exception of the work done by Diana Taylor with her Hemispheric Institute of Performance and Politics, leaves little room for the global opening that characterized NYU during the past decades. In his view, today the department favors two main strands of studies: "everyday life performances" and "performing art". Finally, reflecting on the ontology of performance, Lepecki sees in its "disappearing" the rich potential for its various forms of "reappearing".
Attraverso un excursus storico, teorico e metodologico, questa tesi di dottorato analizza la nascita, gli sviluppi e l'attuale dimensione costitutivo-identitaria dei Performance Studies, un ambito di ricerca accademica che, nato negli Stati Uniti alla fine degli anni Settanta, ha sempre palesato una natura restia nei confronti di qualunque tentativo definitorio. Se i Performance Studies concepiscono la performance sia come oggetto d'analisi sia come lente metodologica, e se, come evidenziato da Richard Schechner, praticamente tutto può essere "elevato a performance" e quindi indagato secondo le categorie analitiche di questa disciplina, ecco allora che, con uno slittamento transitivo e "meta-metodologico", questa ricerca dottorale ha scelto come proprio oggetto di studio i Performance Studies stessi, osservandoli "as performance" e avvalendosi degli strumenti metodologici suggeriti dal suo stesso oggetto d'analisi. Questo lavoro indaga come l'oggetto di studio dei Performance Studies sia, seguendo la teoria schechneriana, il "behaved behavior", e dunque come di conseguenza, il repertorio, prima ancora che l'archivio, possa essere considerato il fedele custode delle "pratiche incorporate". Soffermandosi su esempi di "reenactment" performativo come quelli messi in atto da Marina Abramović e Clifford Owens, così come sui tentativi condotti dalla sezione dell'Intangible Cultural Heritage dell'UNESCO, suggerisce validi esempi di "archiviazione" della performance. L'elaborato prende poi in esame casi che esemplificano la proficua identificazione tra "studiare performance" e "fare performance", sottolinea il ruolo cruciale e imprenscindibile determinato dal lavoro di ricerca sul campo inteso come "osservazione partecipante", ed evidenzia il costante coinvolgimento sociale e politico assunto dai Performance Studies. Questa dissertazione affronta e supporta l'efficacia dei Performance Studies nel proporsi come uno strumento innovativo in grado di analizzare un mondo sempre più performativo nelle sue dinamiche. La loro natura tanto interdisciplinare quanto interculturale sembra farne una lente adeguata attraverso cui promuovere livelli diversi di performance dialogica tra culture localmente distinte ma globalmente assimilabili. ; Through a historical, theoretical and methodological excursus, this thesis analyzes the birth, development and current identity of Performance Studies, an academic research field that, born in the United States at the end of the Seventies, has always been reluctant towards any attempt to be defined. If Performance Studies conceives performance both as an object of analysis and as a methodological lens, and if, as pointed out by Richard Schechner, everything can be studied "as" performance and so investigated according to the analytical categories of this discipline, then, with a transitive and "meta- methodological" shift, this doctoral research takes Performance Studies as its object of study, observing it "as performance" and using the same methodological tools suggested by its object of analysis. This work investigates how the object of study of Performance Studies is, following Schechner's theory, the "behaved behavior", and thus how, as a result, the repertoire, even before the archive can be regarded as the true custodian of "embodied practices". Focusing on examples of performative "reenactment" such as those by Marina Abramović and Clifford Owens, as well as on the efforts undertaken by the UNESCO's Intangible Cultural Heritage section, it suggests valid examples of "archiving performance". The paper then examines cases that exemplify the successful identification of "studying performance" and "doing performance", it underlines the crucial and inescapable role played by the on-field research, understood as "participant observation", and highlights the constant social and political commitment of Performance Studies. This dissertation addresses and supports the effectiveness of Performance Studies in itself as an innovative tool able to analyze a world increasingly performative in its dynamics. Thanks to its both interdisciplinary and intercultural nature, Performance Studies seems to be a proper lens through which to promote different levels of performance dialogue among cultures which are locally different but globally comparable.
