ABSTRACT
This essay draws from Anglo-American philosophy of performance to provide a constructive critique of assumptions embedded in some articulations of performance philosophy’s rationale. The chapter argues that conceptualisations of performance as philosophy connect with – or derive from – a wider body of Anglo-American philosophical literature about performance. This account seeks to challenge the idea that analytic philosophy often adopts a transcendent approach or an “application” model that posits performance as mere illustration of preconceived ideas rather than as itself a source of philosophical insight. Engaging with the contributions of a wide range of thinkers in the analytic tradition – from Goodman, Wollheim, Kivy and McFee – the essay charts the ways in which performance has been both an object of philosophical enquiry and a medium of philosophical investigation in the Anglo-American tradition. The chapter then uses two examples – Jérôme Bel’s (2014) Disabled Theater and Patrick Marber’s 2018 adaptation of Eugene Ionesco’s Exit the King – to demonstrate ways in which performance thinking operates in works of dance and theatre, with the audiences’ affective experience of those works embodying philosophical reflection.
