Performing Dark Arts

In comparison to text-based performances, those of a non-text based nature can illustrate the unity between cultures with less difficulty due to universally understood practices and semiotics in an increasingly globalised world. Non-text based performances provide both beneficial and critical elements when compared to text-based performances and this will be analysed and demonstrated with the example of ‘performing the dark arts’. The will ensue performances of ritualised purposes, conjuring shows, illusionary performances, stage trickery and what is identified as ‘magic’ (more-so than supernatural phenomenon or witchcraft) in order to theorise how non-text based performance has shaped modern cultures, partially through globalisation, whilst creating a comparison to performances based on text.

The type of ‘magic’ researched is noted as what Simon During calls ‘secular’ magic – that of the kind which is not associated with religious or spiritual matters. It is instead an act of performance, mostly for entertainment purposes. It is no less of a performance simply because it does not follow the rigid boundaries that often come with text-based performances. There is a thin line between what is and is not classed as performance as Richard Schechner defined performance as ‘a broad-spectrum or continuum of human actions ranging from ritual, play, popular entertainment, the performing arts (theatre, dance, music) in everyday life performances to gender, race and class roles, and onto healing (from shamanism to surgery)’. He continues to mention that ‘there is no historically or culturally fixable limit to what is or is not a performance. Along the continuum new genres are added and others are dropped. The underlying motion is tha...

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...ing opinions on performances and videos of them with the world, is easier than ever.

Works Cited

During, Simon. Modern Enchantments, The Cultural Power of Secular Magic. United States of America: Harvard University Press, 2002. Print.

Mangan, Michael. Performing Dark Arts, A Cultural History of Conjuring. Bristol: Intellect, 2007. Print.

Schechner, Richard. The Future of Ritual. London: Routledge, 1993. Print.

Schechner, Richard. Performance Studies: An Introduction. 3rd ed. London: Routledge, 2013. Print.

Schechner, Richard and Willa Appel. By Means of Performance, Intercultural Studies of Theatre and Ritual. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990. Print.

Steinkraus, Warren E. 'The Art of Conjuring'. Journal of Aesthetic Education 13.4 (1979): 17-27. Print.

Zarrilli, Phillip et al. Theatre Histories, An Introduction. 2nd ed. London: Routledge, 2010. Print.