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<Shared with permission> There's a debate unfolding on FB about the microaggressions white audience members inflict on black people in theatres, following this spot-on post about the dangers of #theatreetiquette "policing the responses of black people in our safe creative space" 
as ALWAYS HAPPENS, this has descended into a lengthy back-and-forth about the precise point at which theatre behaviour goes from appropriate to inappropriate, according to the (predominantly white) commentators' opinions - which AS ALWAYS are framed as common-sense & obvious.
... which of course has meant the poster - a BW - has been forced to spend the last hour patiently explaining that the kind of engagement she's talking about isn't 'background noise' or rude distracting behaviour, it's an active, engaged, culturally-informed 'call and response'.
and the key is that this kind of patronising back-and-forth about in/appropriateness is still the inevitable consequence of ANY MENTION of theatre behaviour, with white people feeling they have the right to arbitrate "even if we write the sodding play" (as she rightly says)
.@domorisseau has written brilliantly about the very real violence of having your behaviour constantly policed as a BW in theatre according to white abled norms, so if anybody out there is thinking "yeah but..."
pls 1) shhh, and 2) read this immediately: americantheatre.org/2015/12/09/why…
pls 1) shhh, and 2) read this immediately: americantheatre.org/2015/12/09/why…
and if you DO want somebody to debate #theatreetiquette with - fight me.
I wrote a whole book on the C19th roots of 'good' audience behaviour, & how its contemporary enforcement via behaviour-policing is racist, classist, ableist. Yes, even when it's "just about manners & respect" - because these things aren't neutral either: palgrave.com/gb/book/978331…
what you DON'T do is force poc, disabled people, etc, into endless "reasonable" back-and-forth debates where they have to defend their lived experiences against white abled forms - a process in which marginalised audiences tend to be rendered UNreasonable...
... whenever they try simply to express the fact that cultural differences & alternative needs tend to > alternative ideas about what counts as reasonable (appropriate/good behaviour/respectful/etc).
nb My book is called The Reasonable Audience cos of the centrality of "reasonableness" in western law, both in terms of disability & race. Historically it's enabled the privileged to claim that (usually white abled etc) perspectives are objective, reasonable, just common-sense >
... while brilliant scholars writing about race & disability have demonstrated how the legal "reasonable person" construct is actually anything but. See e.g. @NiggaTheory's book Negrophobia and Reasonable Racism; @jenslater_'s Youth and Disability: A Challenge to Mr Reasonable.
(norms - dammit)
see, issa good book (tho not as good as anthony sher's apparently laugh snort) - and currently 40% off* FOR THE NEXT TWO DAYS!
* which still makes it hella expensive, but a bit less wtf-academic-publishing-industry than usual palgrave.com/gb/book/978331…
* which still makes it hella expensive, but a bit less wtf-academic-publishing-industry than usual palgrave.com/gb/book/978331…
fwiw, the thread in question has currently culminated in "Kirsty Sedgman You are right, and I completely agree!!! :)", so it's officially finished close it down now nothing left to say
