Jonathan Bollen

Time, relations and learning in gay men's experiences of adventurous sex

In 1998 social researchers reported that membership of a “culture of sexual adventurism and experimentation” was a predictor of HIV sero‐conversion among homosexually active men living in Sydney. In this paper, we explore how these researchers have understood sexual adventurism as referring to a set of sexual practices, to a subcultural network, and to a particular sexual context. We then present an analysis of the way participants in our study recounted experiences of adventurous sex, focusing on sexual occasions that feature men playing with piss. Ten men, recruited on the basis of self–identification as being into ‘adventurous sex’, were interviewed on two occasions. The first interview invited men to recount experiences of adventurous sex in detail. In the second interview we asked men to provide accounts of their sexual histories or trajectories, and to speculate about their sexual futures. The interviews, which averaged one hour in length, were recorded on audio–tape and subsequently transcribed. The 10 participants were recruited from a list of participants from the Sydney Gay Community Periodic Surveys who had indicated their willingness to participate in further research. The men ranged from 33 to 57 years old. All had had sex with casual male partners in the previous six months. Two had regular male partners. Four of them were HIV–positive, four were HIV–negative and two were serostatus unknown. In contrast with an approach to research that seeks to define clusters of sexual activity across surveys of gay mens sexual practices, our study analysed narratives of sexual occasions recounted by gay men in interviews. This approach produces an interactive and iterative perspective on sexual experience, which we develop in this paper by drawing on the affect theory of Sylvan Tomkins and by attending to aspects of momentum, time and relations as recounted in gay mens experiences of adventurous sex. Through our analysis of interview data, we develop an account of adventurous sex that focuses on how men learn in interaction with others during sexual occasions and over time. We find that approaches to sex research and health education that seek predictability in what men do sexually and rely on men to delimit the scope of their sexual repertoire are incompatible with the attitudes with which men in our study approached and recounted experiences of adventurous sex.

Hidden Dramas: Cartographic Revelations in the World of Theatre Studies

Abstract Et dukkehjem (A Doll’s House) by Henrik Ibsen is one of the most performed modern dramas in the world. Using cartographic and network visualisations, this article divulges a hitherto obscured Nordic history of this play: first, as a product of the cultural and aesthetic blending in the late nineteenth century; then as an icon of nation building in the post-war years; and finally, as a global icon for the Norwegian nation state. While charting this affair between Norway and one of its national cultural treasures, this article also exposes the transmission of an aesthetic heritage. Network visualisations of the Nordic productions of Et dukkehjem reveal an unbroken connection between productions of the play from 1879 to 1991. Oral transmission of production knowledge concerning canonical texts is commonplace in most national theatres, but this is the first study to document the phenomenon within the interpretative history of a single play. By applying time–geography to the production history of a ubiquitous dramatic text, ‘Hidden Dramas’ demonstrates the value of cartographic investigations to the field of theatre historiography.

Data Models for Theatre Research: People, Places, and Performance

Abstract: How are theatre scholars sharing information about people, places, and performance? This essay considers the current prospects for collaborative research on theatre production within the context of recent developments in the digital humanities. It identifies convergence in the way that twelve projects around the world are collecting and organizing information about performance: Abbey Theatre Archives Performance Database (Ireland); AusStage (Australia); Hamm Archives, Brooklyn Academy of Music (US); Global Performing Arts Database (US, Singapore, Japan, Russia, China); IbsenStage (Norway); Internet Broadway Database (US); Staging Beckett (England); Scottish Theatre Archive (Scotland); TheaterEncyclopedie (Netherlands); Theatre Aotearoa (New Zealand); Theatrescapes (Germany); and Toronto Theatre Database (Canada). The essay derives core descriptions for shared concepts from the data models in use, placing emphasis on practical solutions, while recognizing variations in implementation. In the process it distinguishes four levels of determination for concepts of performance, event, production, and work. Recognizing what has been achieved, the essay contributes to the prospects of sharing data among projects. It concludes by illustrating how visualizing information on performance opens new horizons of significance for theatre research at scales ranging from local activity to global networks.

Cross-dressed and Crossing over from Stage to Television

Female impersonation was a popular aspect of light entertainment in mid-twentieth century Australia. On stage, the Kiwis Revue Company, an army entertainment unit from New Zealand, toured extensively for eight years from 1946, with three female impersonators as the highlight of an all-male bill. Female impersonation was also standard fare on variety shows during televisions first decade. In such sketch comedies and spoofs lie televisions strongest claims to inheriting the traditions of variety performance from the stage. Comedic drag roles, in particular, came directly from the stage, for the visual incongruities of costume, wigs and make-up would have had less currency on radio. This article explores the cross-gendered dimensions of light entertainment on television and stage, drawing on film and television recordings at the National Film and Sound Archive and research at Australias performing arts collections.

‘Peddling’ Et dukkehjem: The Role of the State

This chapter investigates three ways in which Norway has contributed to shaping the play’s production history. The first pattern maps the touring trajectories of the early Nordic Noras, who created a major interpretative tradition. The second shows the regional and global flows of Nordic artists and productions from 1914 to 1990. Unbroken artistic networks of artists link these tours back to the premiere of the play in 1879: this degree of artistic interconnection is unprecedented in the study of a single play. The third group of patterns comes from maps showing the post-1990 global distribution of the play. These touring circuits are extensive and have been developed through a series of initiatives put in place by the Norwegian government.

Adaptation at a Distance

This chapter addresses the diversity of adaptations of Ibsen’s play. Using eleven productions for geographical, temporal, and interpretative range–Britain 1889, the USA 1938 and 1987, India 1958, Germany 1981, Nigeria 2006, Japan 2006, Pakistan 2006, Malawi 2006, China 2010, and Chile 2012–the chapter provides visualisations of dramaturgical structures that make us rethink theatrical adaptation. Four key areas emerge: the importance of temporal structures; the relationship between genres and spatial relocations; the importance of empathy in the manipulation of character; and the cultural constraints on narrative relocation. The network analysis shows the flexibility with which the play can be adapted to reflect radically different social structures, the most surprising of which is the loss of female agency.

Mapping the Early Noras

Maps showing this first wave of globalisation of the play are the distant visions that structure this chapter; the patterns on these maps challenge conventional narratives of Ibsen’s career by revealing an early commercial history of his most popular play. Twenty-two Noras were responsible for spreading the play around the world; this chapter follows their journeys to Asia, Australasia, and the Americas, and examines the critical reception of their performances. To understand why these actresses devoted so much of their creative energy to the international dissemination of this play, the lives of eight significant world Noras are considered: Alla Nazimova, Matsui Sumako, Gabriela Zapolska, Janet Achurch, Eleonora Duse, Eleanor Marx, Lin Ping, and Olga Chekhova. This chapter uncovers a major social force behind the first global success of the play. Although discernible in multiple and sometimes contradictory ways, this force is the European women’s rights movements of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

Ibsen’s Challenge: The Tarantella Rehearsal

Investigating multiple versions of a single scene from Ibsen’s play, the tarantella rehearsal, this chapter examines patterns from 150 productions. The prototype tree design includes a trunk (the most recurring image) as the iconic image of Nora with the tambourine raised above her head performing an Italian folk dance. The four branches that depart from this interpretation are the branch of cuts and substitutions; the voyeuristic branch; the branch of transgressions where Nora breaks through respectable conventions of drawing-room entertainment to embody some form of social negation; and the branch of other dancing bodies where new corporeal representations challenge assumptions about heterosexual desire and the social organisation of gender. Our analysis uncovers some of the social, political, and representational forces at work within Et dukkehjem.

Fists, boots and blues

Conflict and emotions are at the heart of all drama, but conflict can only be expressed by articulate people. When realism descends to the inhabitants of the backyard, conflict has to be couched in monosyllables and emotions have to take the form of physical violence. It is difficult to think of any Australian play which does not end up with a ‘blue.’ Passionate expression almost inevitably takes the form of fists and boots in a drama which cannot make full use of language.(Hunt 1960: 17)