Matters of Urgency – Herausforderungen der Gegenwart in Theater und Wissenschaft

The multitude of virulent and urgent conflicts of a present experienced as crisis-ridden not only shakes the theatre and the entire art and cultural life, but also affects the future of the discipline of theatre studies. Against this background, an awareness has grown that urgent social challenges must be placed in relation to theatre, dance and performance and examined analytically, theoretically and historically. This volume documents contributions from the 15th Congress of the Gesellschaft für Theaterwissenschaft and offers an overview of the topics currently perceived and discussed as urgent by theatre scholars from Germany, Austria and Switzerland. The title of the volume is to be understood in a double sense: ‘Matters’ as topics and fields of research that are brought to the attention of theatre studies due to their social relevance, but also as an indication of the materiality and mediality of the confrontation with these topics.