Christopher Martin, Ph.D.
Writer + Content Creator

THR xxx - Performing Power and Individualism on American and German Stages

Proposed Course

Performing Power and Individualism on American and German Stages takes an intersectional, interdisciplinary, and intertextual approach to whiteness, critical race theory, and transnationalism. In light of the intertwined history of the United States and Germany for over 200 years, this course sets out to examine the contemporary moment in light of this history. This course will apply theory to theatre texts, performances, audio-visual materials, and other writings. This course consists of six modules that attempt to examine how whiteness works to remain a non-racialized subject position in order to protect and reify expectations of white privilege. Since whiteness uses “the other” in order to define itself, this course will rely and lean upon non-white voices to mark whiteness. Because whiteness persists in the contemporary, this course will identify and examine strategies for marking, unmasking, and undermining whiteness.



Module 1 - Formations of Race and Whiteness

In this module, we looked at race, whiteness, and blackness, and how these ideas were formed and came to be defined in relation to each other. By examining "ideals" of beauty as framed in Dyer's White, along with Omi and Winant's Racial Formation Theory, we are able to think about difference in Edna Saint Vincent-Millay's Aria da Capo, and understand the gravity of the historical moment when James Baldwin debates Williams F. Buckley. In addition to, or in place of the prompts in the syllabus, please frame your comments around ways these materials have helped you understand our current historical moment.

Christopher MartinComment