In recent years drag performance has moved from the fringes to emerge as a mainstream phenomenon, showcased on TV shows in the US and the UK.
This collection offers a diverse range of critical engagements by drag performers, makers, scholars and writers reflecting on work from the UK, USA, Israel, Germany and Australia. Moving beyond discussions of gender theory, the essays consider contemporary drag performance practices, connecting them to the histories, communities and politics that produced them.
Chapters range across discussions of drag kings in the US, UK and drag and activism; the influence of RuPaul on the generation of new forms of work in New York; transfeminist critiques of drag; 'bio'/faux queens;
engagements with race and ethnicity through drag performance; drag andragogy; audience concerns; drag intersections with animal personas, and how drag performance relates to personal narratives of history and identity.
Collectively the contributions focus on drag as a mode of performance that is diverse and that uncorsets the easy thought that drag is simply a cross dressing man in a dress or a woman in a suit.
Brater, Enoch: -
Enoch Brater is the Kenneth T. Rowe Collegiate Professor of Dramatic Literature, Professor of English and Theater at the University of Michigan and the series editor of Methuen Drama's Miller scholarly editions. He has written extensively on the work of Samuel Beckett and Arthur Miller.
Enoch Brater is the Kenneth T. Rowe Collegiate Professor of Dramatic Literature, Professor of English and Theater at the University of Michigan. He is series editor of Methuen Drama's Arthur Miller scholarly editions, and with Mark Taylor-Batty of Methuen Drama's Engage series. He has written extensively on the work of Samuel Beckett and Arthur Miller.
Edward, Mark: - Dr Mark Edward is a pracademic and Reader in Dance and Performance at Edge Hill University, UK. His publications include Mesearch and the Performing Body (2018) besides book chapters for Oxford University Press, Springer, Sage, and Supernova Books. Professionally he has worked for Rambert Dance Company and performed with the renowned American performance artist Penny Arcade in her seminal work 'Bad Reputation' (2004) and in Jeremy Goldstein's 'Truth to Power Café' (2018). Mark is also the writer and producer of the immersive performance and film installation 'Council House Movie Star' (2012) featuring his drag persona Gale Force.
Farrier, Stephen: - Dr Stephen Farrier is Reader in Theatre and Performance, at The Royal Central School of Speech and Drama, University of London, UK. With Alyson Campbell has has co-edited Queer Dramaturgies: International Perspectives on Where Performance Leads Queer (2015) as well as a themed edition of RIDE, The Journal of Applied Theatre and Performance named the 'Gender and Sexuality Issue'.
Taylor-Batty, Mark: - Mark Taylor-Batty is Associate Professor of Theatre Studies and Deputy Head of School in the School of English at the University of Leeds, UK. His previous publications include The Theatre of Harold Pinter (Bloomsbury, 2014), About Pinter: The Playwright and the Work (Faber and Faber, 2005), Roger Blin: Collaborations and Methodologies (Peter Lang, 2007) and, he co-authored with his wife, Juliette Taylor-Batty, Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot (Continuum, 2009).
