Introduction

This introduction provides an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book examines how media practices can be understood against the disciplinary background of both media and communication studies and theatre and dance studies. It presents individual case studies, which use the concept of media practices to address the social, aesthetic and political dimensions of processes of social change. These case studies span a broad geographical terrain—from Egypt to Japan, from Mexico to Turkey, from Greece to Germany—and outline in what ways media practices can be applied in very different socio-political contexts and for different individual and collective actors. The book introduces concepts of mediality in the realm of dance and theatre. These two genres can serve as media of communication by inheriting always already multiple medial qualities, that e.g. position bodies and movements in modes of transmission that go beyond its primary purposes.