Mothering Performance: Maternal Action

260 Pages·2022·5.799 MB·English

by  Lena Šimić, Emily Underwood-Lee

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Routledge Advances in Theatre & Performance Studies
MOTHERING PERFORMANCE
MATERNAL ACTION
Edited by Lena Šimic´ and Emily Underwood-Lee
Mothering Performance
Mothering Performance is a combination of scholarly essays and creative
responses which focus on maternal performance and its applications from a
variety of interdisciplinary perspectives.
This collection extends the concept and action of ‘performance’ and con-
nects it to the idea of ‘mothering’ as activity. Mothering, as a form of doing,
is a site of never-ending political and personal production; it is situated in
a specific place, and it is undertaken by specific bodies, marked by experi-
ence and context. The authors explore the potential of a maternal sensibility
to move us towards maternal action that is explicitly political, ethical, and
in relation to our others. Presented in three sections, Exchange, Practice,
and Solidarity, the book includes international contributions from scholars
and artists covering topics including ecology, migration, race, class, history,
incarceration, mental health, domestic violence, intergenerational exchange,
childcare, and peacebuilding. The collection gathers diverse maternal per-
formance practices and methodologies which address aesthetics, dramaturgy,
activism, pregnancy, everyday mothering, and menopause.
The book is a great read for artists, maternal health and care professionals,
and scholars. Researchers with an interest in feminist performance and moth-
erhood, within the disciplines of performance studies, maternal studies, and
women’s studies, and all those who wish to gain a deeper understanding of
maternal experience, will find much of interest.
Lena Šimic´ is a Reader in Drama at Edge Hill University.
Emily Underwood-Lee is Professor of Performance Studies at the George
Ewart Evans Centre for Storytelling at the University of South Wales.
Routledge Advances in Theatre & Performance Studies
This series is our home for cutting-edge, upper-level scholarly studies and
edited collections. Considering theatre and performance alongside topics
such as religion, politics, gender, race, ecology, and the avant-garde, titles are
characterized by dynamic interventions into established subjects and innova-
tive studies on emerging topics.
Playwriting in Europe
Mapping Ecosystems and Practices with Fabulamundi
Margherita Laera
“Don’t Forget the Pierrots!” The Complete History
of British Pierrot Troupes & Concert Parties
Tony Lidington
The Spectre of Tradition and the Aesthetic-Political
Movement of Theatre and Performance
An Intercultural Perspective
Min Tian
Devised Theatre’s Collaborative Performance
Making Masterpieces from Collective Concepts
Telory D. Arendell
Harold Pinter’s Shakespeare
Shakespeare’s Influence on the Work of Harold Pinter
Charles Morton
Mothering Performance
Maternal Action
Lena Šimic´ and Emily Underwood-Lee
A Sourcebook of Performance Labor
Activators, Activists, Archives, All
Joey Orr
Mothering Performance
Maternal Action
Edited by Lena Šimic´ and
Emily Underwood-Lee
First published 2023
by Routledge
4 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
and by Routledge
605 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10158
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
© 2023 selection and editorial matter, Lena Šimic´ and Emily
Underwood-Lee; individual chapters, the contributors
The right of Lena Šimic´ and Emily Underwood-Lee to be identified
as the authors of the editorial material, and of the authors for their
individual chapters, has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and
78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
The Open Access version of this book, available at www.taylorfrancis.
com, has been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-
Non Commercial-No Derivatives 4.0 license.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks
or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and
explanation without intent to infringe.
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Šimic´, Lena, editor. | Underwood-Lee, Emily, editor.
Title: Mothering performance: maternal action / edited by Lena Šimic´,
Emily Underwood-Lee.
Description: First Edition. | New York: Routledge, 2023. | Series:
Routledge Advances in Theatre and Performance Studies | Includes
bibliographical references and index. | Identifiers: LCCN 2022028908
(print) | LCCN 2022028909 (ebook) | ISBN 9781032138046
(Hardback) | ISBN 9781032138442 (Paperback) | ISBN
9781003231073 (eBook)
Subjects: LCSH: Motherhood. | Mothers.
Classification: LCC HQ759 .M884 2023 (print) | LCC HQ759 (ebook) | DDC
306.874/3--dc23/eng/20220721
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022028908
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022028909
ISBN: 9781032138046 (hbk)
ISBN: 9781032138442 (pbk)
ISBN: 9781003231073 (ebk)
DOI: 10.4324/9781003231073
Typeset in Bembo
by KnowledgeWorks Global Ltd.
Contents
List of figures viii
List of contributors ix
Acknowledgements xv
Introduction: Maternal Action as Exchange, Practice,
and Solidarity 1
LENA ŠIMIC´ AND EMILY UNDERWOOD-LEE
SECTION I
Exchange 13
1 Thinking Back through Our Mothers: The Editors
in Conversation 15
ALICE ENTWISTLE WITH LENA ŠIMIC´ AND EMILY UNDERWOOD-LEE
2 Conversations with Mother Artists on the Dynamics
of Support in India 29
RUCHIKA WASON SINGH WITH SHOBHA BROOTA AND POOJA IRANNA
3 HomeBody 38
EVE DENT AND ZOË GINGELL
4 Siôl Fagu: A Consideration in Four Stories 47
CHRISTINE WATKINS
5 Mom, Me, and the Maternal at Work 54
ROIYAH SALTUS WITH SOLANGE SALTUS
6 There Are Other Worlds: Maternal Knowledge
beyond Borders 67
ELENA MARCHEVSKA
vi Contents
SECTION II
Practice 81
7 Dramaturgies of Support and Interruption
in the Process of Wonderwoman: The Naked Truth
by Notnow Collective 83
KRISTINA GAVRAN
8 Gravida, the Weight and Wait of Pregnancy
to Mothering Transformation: A Performance
Exploring Traumatic Memory and the Energy
of Creation 98
CARRIE WESTWATER WITH ALEKSANDRA NIKOLAJEV JONES
9 Motherswitch 107
TRACY BREATHNACH
10 Did I Request Thee, Maker, from My Minced Meat
to Mould Me Infant?: Or MANIFESTO FOR
A MATERNAL AESTH-ETHICS, Proposal
for “PROVOCATION and PRACTICE” 117
FREYA VERLANDER
11 Maternal Poetics of Care in Plastic Spaces 132
PROPHECY SUN
12 Claiming Spaces: Aprons of Power - Places of Power
Performances 140
RACHEL FALLON
SECTION III
Solidarity 149
13 Who Does She Think She Is? Kate Middleton?!:
Leaky Escapes in Un-classy Maternal Performance 151
JODIE HAWKES
14 Physical and Symbolic Loss: Composite Monologues
of Women Parenting While Incarcerated 163
HELENA D. LEWIS
Contents vii
15 Performing and Transforming the Maternal:
A Ref Lexive Inquiry Using Digital Storytelling
for Mutual Learning 171
LEAH SALTER
16 Weaving Enfleshed Citizenship (M)otherwise 185
SARA C. MOTTA
17 Dispatches from the Front: Midwifery in a Pandemic 204
LAURA GODFREY-ISAACS
18 Maternal Performance as Peacebuilding 213
JENNIFER VERSON
Conclusion: On Sustaining Mothering Performance 228
LENA ŠIMIC´ AND EMILY UNDERWOOD-LEE
Index 237
Figures
3.1 No Doormat work in progress by Zoë Gingell. 40
3.2 You Must Fall into Step text intervention by Zoë Gingell
and durational performance by Eve Dent, HouseMADE
Residency, Brickstock Arts Festival, Cardiff 2016. 42
4.1 The author’s family siôl fagu, courtesy of the artist, 2021. 48
7.1 Kristina Gavran writing this article while her baby is sleeping
on her shoulder. Working table, July 2021. 85
7.2 Tina supporting Kristina in her writing. Rehearsal and marketing
photo Wonderwoman: The Naked Truth, MAC, Birmingham,
May 2016. 87
8.1 Gravida, Chapter Arts Centre, Cardiff, 2018. 103
11.1 Magical beast: The space within, out and in-between, prOphecy
sun and Luciana D’Anunciação, 2018. Performance
photograph of prOphecy sun holding inf latable by Reese
Muntean. Gold Saucer Studios, Vancouver BC, Canada. 133
11.2 Carrying Others, prOphecy sun, and Reese Muntean, 2019. 134
12.1 Je me souviens – I remember, Aprons of Power – Places
of power performance at Sean McDermott Street Magdalene
laundry, Dublin. 141
13.1 Playing Kate: Outside the hospital, Jodie Hawkes, 2017. 154
16.1 Grief-Dignity ceremony of solidarity with the madres/
mothers and comadres/aunties of Colombia, 9 May 2021,
held with permission on unceded Worimi ceremonial land,
Mulumbimba-Newcaslte, NSW, so called Australia. Photo
of three of the holders of the space-ceremony, Auntie Theresa
Ann Dargin, Worimi ceremonial elder (left), Priestess Jann
Ravenfeather (centre), Sara C. Motta (right). 191
17.1 Laura Godfrey-Isaacs self-portrait, PPE2, gouache on
paper, A4 size, image courtesy of the artist, 2021. 206
18.1 Author’s photo of handling session at International
Slavery Museum, Liverpool, UK, 2017. 219
Contributors
Dr Tracy Breathnach (Evans) is a somatic performance artist, researcher,
and writer based in South Wales. Originally from Ireland, she has worked
extensively in communities in the United Kingdom and abroad for over
20 years. Breathnach’s research is practice-based and explores embodied
storytelling, identity, and trauma. Her PhD focused on autobiographical
birth story-telling. From this, she has developed a trauma-informed
programme called Birth Café for women in the community to find new
ways of telling their experiences in partnership with People Speak Up.
She has presented widely on maternal performance and gave a TedX talk
in 2020. She works as a Research Officer in Swansea University and a
transformational coach with her company Break Free & Thrive, alongside
maintaining her creative practice and mothering two sons.
Eve Dent is an artist who explores the poetic interweaving and inter-
relationship between sense of self, body, and environment through
performance, installation, film, and photography. She has performed
widely in the United Kingdom and Europe since 1999.
Alice Entwistle is Professor of Contemporary Poetry and Textual Aesthetics
at the University of South Wales. She is the author of In Her Own Words:
Women talking poetry and Wales (Seren 2014) and Poetry Geography Gender
(University of Wales Press, 2013). Her latest monograph, a single author
study of bilingual Welsh writer Gwyneth Lewis, published by University
of Wales Press in the prestigious “Writers in Wales” series, is forthcoming.
Rachel Fallon is a visual artist who deals with themes of protection and
defence in domestic realms and addresses the topic of motherhood and
women’s relationships to society. Her work encompasses sculpture, drawing,
photography, and performance and is firmly rooted in the processes of
making. As well as an individual practice, she regularly collaborates with
other artists and collectives; including The Artists’ Campaign to Repeal
the Eighth Amendment, Desperate Artwives, Grrrl Zine Fair, and the
Magdalene Series. The two disparate ways of working, individually and
collaboratively, feed into one another and are therefore equally important
parts of her practice. She lives and works in Ireland.