Theatre Econiches: Sites of Bounded Licit and Illicit Affordances for Behavior

Abstract

This essay reports on cumulative observations and participation in material theatres and the human behaviours that these locales afford. The central theoretical stance is primarily from the standpoint of James J. Gibson’s theories of ecological perception and subsequent developments by researchers working from the same or similar points of view. The concept of presentation uses Sociologist Erving Goffman’s The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life (1956). Both Gibson and Goffman had been actors, and Goffman as an assistant athletic director. Nearly every sentence could have a citation from a relevant scientific study; but this is a report emerging from participatory observation rather than from those studies. A major basis is attending a dozen London performances each year from 2002 to 2024, excepting 2021. Likewise, reference to theatre studies is limited. Although recent decades of these studies show increasing attention to ecological themes, Cartesian separation of people and the locale continues. An exception is a 2021 doctoral dissertation that cites Gibson and a somewhat ecological position. Also informative and exceptional is Marvin Carlson’s Theories of the Theatre (1993) and multiple conversations with Carlson. The author hopes to stimulate tightly focused research that will further our understanding of our human selves as in seamless continuity with our econiches embedded in the local, global, and universal.

Acknowledgements

It is important to mention that the fundamental source for this essay is decades of formal study of theatre and participation in productions from elementary school through university, as well as attending as many as twenty plays each year except during the Covid restrictions. This attendance was with a stable group, many of whom have held professional theatre positions. There were formal discussion classes, often with a guest professional from the London theatres. The group knew that I was doing special studies, including observing their responses. It is a speculative essay rather than a report on a controlled scientific experiment. It is hoped that it will have some resonance with the scientific investigator’s tacit knowledge and stimulate future controlled experiment.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 The word “entertaining,” like the word “beauty” has multiple meanings. Here it means to capture and hold attention with pleasurable result.

2 Hindu American Foundation; Hindu Scriptures https://www.hinduamerican.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/Scriptures2.0_0.pdf. The earliest theatre as such is now thought to be performance presentations of the Rig Veda texts in India. Histories and theories of theatre available to Euro-American Global North and all of the Americas preponderantly begin with Greek theatre then head west and north, but with attention to Russian theatre of the nineteenth century to the present. More recently, histories and theories of Chinese and Japanese theatre are available.

3 The author’s approach to studies in the perception of the arts was precipitously broadened and deepened by a remark the late Michael Turvey made during a discussion at the ISEP conference in Groningen, July 3–6, 2019: “But what about Difflugia. Don’t forget Difflugia.” Turvey’s discussion of earthworms (Turvey, 2019, pp. 316–317) also casts a wider light.

4 See “Inside the minds of farm animals,” a web selection from Science: https://www.science.org/content/article/not-dumb-creatures-livestock-surprise-scientists-their-complex-emotional-minds/December 2023.

5 This statement is based upon the author’s several attendances of performances at the Orange Tree over a period of several years, and on discussions with members of the theatre study program who also have viewed the same performances. This is true also of the 2024 Guys and Dolls performance at Bridge.