Musical Theatre in Contemporary Taiwan - Call for Papers
| Type of post: | Association news item |
| Sub-type: | No sub-type |
| Posted By: | Jonathan Bollen |
| Status: | Current |
| Date Posted: | Thu, 25 Jul 2024 |
Musical Theatre in Contemporary Taiwan
An International Conference for the Twentieth Anniversary of the Graduate Institute of Performing Arts at National Taiwan Normal University
Call for Papers
Conference dates: Friday 25 and Saturday 26 April 2025
Conference venue: National Taiwan Normal University, College of Education, International Conference Room 202, Heping East Road, Da'an District, Taipei.
Over recent years, the production of musical theatre in Taiwan has grown substantially. Theatre companies are presenting musicals in a wide variety of styles, engaging an expanding pool of artists, and broadening the opportunities for spectators to attend live performance. Productions of musical theatre are now attracting spectators in large numbers to venues across Taiwan, with tickets for performances often selling out quickly. A new chapter in Taiwan's history of musical theatre is being written.
Among the performing arts in Taiwan, musical theatre may still be considered an emerging genre. The production of King of Chess(棋王) in May 1987 marks an early milestone in the history of musicals created in Taiwan. In comparison with western histories that trace the emergence of musicals from European operetta and American variety in the mid-to-late nineteenth century, the development of musical theatre inTaiwan over the last three decades is distinctive. Alongside musicals produced in the Broadway-style, approaches to creating musicals in Taiwan are constantly evolving. There are works that combine popular entertainments, non-mainstream culture and traditional theatre forms, and there are works that focus on particular languages, ethnic groups or historical sources, reflecting the diversity of the population. Although productions were disrupted during the pandemic years, the creative momentum for many artists involved in musical theatre in Taiwan has now largely recovered and audiences have returned to the theatres.
Tracing these developments, graduate students have written a considerable number of theses on works of musical theatre and the production industry in Taiwan, although broader scholarly discussion remains relatively rare. Scholars may inherit assumptions from western theatre in focusing on the primacy of drama and treating music and dance as secondary decorations, following Eric Bentley'sPlaywright as Thinker. However, the dramaturgy of musicals is found in the tension between the 'lyric time' of the songs and the 'book time' of the story, as Scott McMillin argues in The Musical as Drama. Accordingly, song and dance are no less significant than character, setting and plot, and so it is only by considering the two 'orders of time' that we can fully appreciate the form.
Given the investment required to bring a musical work to the stage, the relation between artistic ideals and commercial realities the market for musicals must also be addressed. Recent innovations in production with multiple casts, frequent revivals, and serial productions are broadening the audience for musicals and developing new patterns of theatre going among young working adults. The stories presented in Taiwan musicals no longer embrace only romance, comedy and family fun. New musicals are also adapting classic plays and literary works, and confronting contemporary concerns like campus bullying, gender diversity, physical and mental illness, the politics of cultural identity and transformative justice. The expanding forms and diverse contents of musical theatre in contemporary Taiwan deserve in-depth scholarly discussion.
The Graduate Institute of Performing Arts at National Taiwan Normal University was established in 2005. In cultivating the musical talents of theatre-makers for the future, it continues its contributions to performing, creating and producing musical theatre in Taiwan. To mark our 20th anniversary, we invite artists and scholars from around the world to share their expertise, insights and research. Taking the development of musical theatre in contemporary Taiwan as our point of departure, the conference invites papers that address (but are not limited to) the following topics:
- Musicals and popular entertainment
- Musicals and linguistic diversity
- Musicals and traditional theatre
- Musicals in unconventional venues
- Musicals and touring
- Musicals and adaptation
- Broadway, West End and musicals in Taiwan
- Transnational musicals and local productions
- Musicals in Asia
- Musicals and criticism
Submission instructions:
This conference accepts papers in Chinese or English. Please submit the abstract by 20 August 2024. The submission should include the title of the paper, the abstract of the paper (up to 600 words in Chinese and 300 words in English), three to six key words, presenter's biography (up to 300 words in Chinese and 150 words in English), institutional affiliation and contact information. Please send the .docx file to the conference-specific email address: musicaltheatretaiwan@
The conference organising committee will invite the review panel to assess the submitted abstracts and notify the outcomes by email in early September 2024. The abstracts of papers presented at the conference will be published on the conference website. The full text of the paper will be included in the conference proceedings with the presenter's permission. The conference proceedings will only be made available on request to the host, presenters and discussants.
Conference organisers: Lia Liang Wen-Ching (lia.liang@ntnu.edu.tw) and Jonathan Bollen (jonathan.bollen@ntnu.
Conference contact: James Jan (61292031m@ntnu.edu.tw)
Web (Chinese/English): https://
| For more information, see: | www.gipa.ntnu.edu.tw/index.php/2024/05/31/elementor-13140/ |
