Abstract
Since the millennium, immersive theatre has developed and emerged into the mainstream, with companies like Punchdrunk enjoying immense popular success. This shift in the theatre world has corresponded to significant changes in technology. Alongside the advent of Google and the entrance of video gaming into the wider public consciousness, the popularity of social networking has proved such that it has quickly become an intrinsic part of many people’s everyday lives. Currently almost a billion people, one-seventh of the world’s population, log into Facebook daily, and that figure is rising. As the time spent on social media escalates, it inevitably impacts on how we think, behave and communicate, with effects reaching far beyond the self to every corner of our lives, theatre included. Building on theories recently presented by neuroscientist Susan Greenfield, this article considers the relationship between social networking and mind change in theatre audiences. In particular, it focuses on how changing patterns in our communication and relationships with others, and in our construction of identity and sense of self, have brought about corresponding changes in what we want as audience members, and in the context of supply and demand, have responded to and shaped immersive theatre.
Works Cited
Alston, Adam. “Audience Participation and Neoliberal Value: Risk, Agency and Responsibility in Immersive Theatre”. Performance Research 18.2 (2013): 128–38. Print.10.1080/13528165.2013.807177Search in Google Scholar
Dickson, Andrew. “Best Theatre of 2012, No 9: You Me Bum Bum Train”. Guardian 11 December 2012. Web. <http://www.theguardian.com/stage/2012/dec/11/best-theatre-2012-you-me-bum>. (Date of access: 5 May 2015).Search in Google Scholar
Gardner, Lyn. “You Me Bum Bum Train”. Guardian 6 July 2010. Web. <http://www.theguardian.com/stage/2010/jul/06/you-me-bum-bum-train-review>. (Date of access: 3 August 2015).Search in Google Scholar
Gianniba, Poly. Rev. of The Drowned Man: A Hollywood Fable. The Other Bridge Project, 22 June 2013. Web. <https://theotherbridgeproject.wordpress.com/2013/06/22/review-punchdrunks-the-drowned-man-a-hollywood-fable/>. (Date of access: 11 May 2015).Search in Google Scholar
Goffman, Erving. The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life. London: Penguin, 1990. Print.Search in Google Scholar
Government Office for Science. “Foresight Future Identities: Final Project Report”. The Government Office for Science, London, 4 January 2013. Web. <https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/273966/13-523-future-identities-changing-identities-report.pdf>. (Date of access: 3 August 2015).Search in Google Scholar
Greenfield, Susan. Mind Change: How Digital Technologies Are Leaving Their Mark on Our Brains. London and New York: Routledge, 2014. Print.Search in Google Scholar
Konrath, Sara, Edward O’Brien, and Courtney Hsing. “Changes in Dispositional Empathy in American College Students Over Time: A Meta-Analysis”. Personality and Social Psychology Review 15.2 (2011): 180–98. Print.10.1177/1088868310377395Search in Google Scholar
Machon, Josephine. Immersive Theatres: Intimacy and Immediacy in Contemporary Performance. Basingstoke and New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013. Print.10.1007/978-1-137-01985-1Search in Google Scholar
Manago, Adriana, Tamara Taylor, and Patricia Greenfield. “Me and My 400 Friends: The Anatomy of College Students’ Facebook Networks, Their Communication Patterns and Well-Being”. Developmental Psychology 48.2 (2012): 369–80. Print.10.1037/a0026338Search in Google Scholar
McMullan, Thomas. “The Immersed Audience”. Guardian 20 May 2014. Web. <http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/may/20/how-theatre-is-taking-its-cue-from-video-games>. (Date of access: 4 May 2015).Search in Google Scholar
Mental Health Foundation. “The Lonely Society”. Mental Health Foundation, May 2010. Web. <http://www.mentalhealth.org.uk/content/assets/pdf/publications/the_lonely_society_report.pdf>. (Date of access: 25 August 2015).Search in Google Scholar
O’Connell, Ryan. “The Pros and Cons of Deleting your Facebook”. Thought Catalog, May 2011. Web. <http://thoughtcatalog.com/ryan-oconnell/2011/05/the-pros-and-cons-to-deleting-your-facebook/>. (Date of Access: 1 May 2015).Search in Google Scholar
Rosen, Larry D. iDisorder: Understanding Our Obsession with Technology and Overcoming Its Hold on Us. Basingstoke and New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011. Print.Search in Google Scholar
Silvestre, Agnès. “Punchdrunk and the Politics of Spectatorship”. Culturebot 14 November 2012. Web. <http://www.culturebot.org/2012/11/14997/punchdrunk-and-the-politics-of-spectatorship/>. (Date of access: 4 May 2015).Search in Google Scholar
Stewart, Kenneth and Paul Bernhardt. “Comparing Millennials to Pre-1987 Students and with One Another”. North American Journal of Psychology 12.3 (2010): n. pag. Web. <http://www.freepatentsonline.com/article/North-American-Journal-Psychology/245167907.html>. (Date of access: 2 January 2016)Search in Google Scholar
Tamir, Diana and Jason Mitchell. “Disclosing Information about the Self is Intrinsically Rewarding”. PNAS 109.21 (2012): 8038–45. Print.10.1073/pnas.1202129109Search in Google Scholar
Twenge, Jean and Joshua Foster. “Birth Cohort Increases in Narcissistic Personality Traits among American College Students, 1982–2009”. Social Psychological and Personality Science 1.1 (2010): 99–106. Print.10.1177/1948550609355719Search in Google Scholar
Weinschenk, Susan. “100 Things You should Know about People #8: Dopamine Makes You Addicted to Seeking Information”. The Team W Blog, 7 November 2009. Web. <http://www.blog.theteamw.com/2009/11/07/100-things-you-should-know-about-people-8-dopamine-makes-us-addicted-to-seeking-information/>. (Date of access: 11 May 2015).Search in Google Scholar
White, Gareth. “On Immersive Theatre”. Theatre Research International 37.3 (2012): 221–35. Print.10.1017/S0307883312000880Search in Google Scholar
Bionote
Olivia Turnbull is Senior Lecturer in Drama at Bath Spa University. Her work focuses on cultural and economic policy, gender and theatre, experimental performance, and performance and new media. Most recently, her research has turned to companies and practitioners who are challenging traditional modes of theatregoing, particularly in the context of new technology. She is author of the book Bringing Down the House: The Crisis in Britain’s Regional Theatres (Intellect, 2009).
© 2016 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston
