Abstract
This article proposes conceptual working definitions for alternative theater and alternative spatiality as they apply to postindependence Zimbabwean theater practice. These conceptual definition proposals identify and delineate the contemporary Zimbabwean spatial appreciation of alternative performance space and esthetic practice. In this article, I implicate alternative performance esthetics and spatiality in how the past, as the people’s cultural frame of reference, can remain compatible with the demands of the present, and possibly the future. As a popular strategy, alternative theater performance spaces are presented as ways of reworking the colonial mapping process leading to the development of a new map, that is, a visible site of deconstructive attack. This remapping process presents a new spatial and esthetic knowledge situated within hybrid/ syncretic alternative performance space.
If I possessed a theatre of my own, I should not convey on to paper the designs which are in my mind, but I should place them directly on the stage. (Craig in Howard, 2002, p. 14) In contemporary theatre practice, the stage is undergoing a transition and theatre artists are striving for new methods of presentation. This change is more evident in the process of mechanisation and adaptation of staging styles and techniques to fit into existing stages. (Eni, 2013, p. 159)
Introduction
This article proposes conceptual definitions for alternative theater and alternative performance space as they apply to postliberation African theater practice. These conceptual definition proposals identify and delineate the contemporary Zimbabwean spatial appreciation of alternative performance space and esthetic practice. In this article, I implicate alternative performance esthetics and spatiality in “how the past, as the people’s cultural frame of reference, can remain compatible with the demands of the present, and possibly the future” (Chinyowa, 2009, p. 285). As a popular strategy, alternative theater performance spaces are presented as ways of reworking the colonial “mapping process” leading to the development of a new map that is a “visible site of deconstructive attack” (Gilbert & Tompkins, 1996, p. 147). This remapping process presents a new spatial and esthetic knowledge situated within hybrid/ syncretic alternative performance space.
Theoretically, I approach this debate from a syncretic perspective. Syncretism denotes the combination or alliance of opposing philosophical doctrines often with political undertones that result in public and private rituals and commonly accepted local practices, which appear to the observer to link orientations that are normally disparate, if not disjunctive (Claus & Mills, 2003). As a theoretical concept, syncretism is deployed to describe the state or condition of alternative performance space in Zimbabwe and the process by which such conditions occur (Claus & Mills, 2003; Leopold & Jensen, 2004; Shalaby, 2013) as well as its influence on esthetic practice. Within a specifically British colonial setup, such as Rhodesia/Zimbabwe, Balme (1999) argues that conceptually syncretism enables the development of a “theoretical discourse which questions some of the fundamental principles of British theatrical aesthetics” (pp. 23-24). It is able to do this, Derrida (1994) proposes, through creating “discursive stratifications and ephemeral formations [that] produce a new discourse” (p. 118). This new discourse emerges out of an analysis of the alternative theater practitioner’s cultural, political, and economic experience in the post colony. Although these conditions are broadly applicable in Africa due to her colonial history, different cultural mixes generate distinctly different aesthetic practices.
Spatially, the colonial Rhodesian Cartesian spatial grid, which had been normalized and became an invisible mapping strategy suppressing organic cultural paradigms of place development is subverted through artistic means. My argument here is that in the postcolonial Third World, cultures begin to infuse themselves, sometimes transforming the normalized developmental process and sometimes disrupting it. Although this developmental process is often met with contestation from those who have become submerged in the colonial ways or desire the colonial benefits, it inspires new (spatial) forms that create the conditions in which the subaltern groups can liberate themselves (Spivak, 1990).
The theoretical concepts of syncretism such as borrowing/appropriation and repurposing are deployed to describe and explain transactions, between indigenous and colonial/colonial residual paradigms, which led to the emergence of alternative esthetic practice. According to Bill Ashcroft, Griffiths, and Tiffin (2000) appropriation is used to describe the ways in which post-colonial societies take over those aspects of the imperial culture- language, forms of writing, film, even modes of thought and argument such as rationalism, logic and analysis—that may be of use to them in articulating identities. (p. 15)
The net result of the appropriation of dominant colonial/colonial residual modes of representation and spatiality, in this example, fundamentally alters the appropriated (spatiality and performance practice) and the appropriator (alternative theater practitioner; Claus & Mills, 2003). The postcolonial experience, therefore, is characteristically syncretic. Spatial practice and experience are thus explored as a new phenomenon that bridges the continuum between colonial/colonial residual and precolonial paradigms into an evolving present.
In addition, syncretism is deployed to challenge alternative theater practitioners to continuously question the ability of British colonial residual models and theoretical positions of representation as adequate representations of their histories and lives (Spivak, 1990; Hooks, 1994). Deployed in this manner, syncretism acquires political value in that it challenges and guards against universal claims of Marxism, national liberation movements, or Liberal feminism to speak for the oppressed (Morton, 2003). The political value-laden concept of syncretism is also particularly useful in understanding the usage of street dialects (language) as signs which articulate the deconstruction of colonial residual representative models.
As a syncretic model, alternative theater is a “transitional concept for describing the relationship between [Zimbabwean] culture and aesthetics” (Balme, 1999, p. 16). The proposed conceptual categories are African because they are located in the materiality and practice paradigms of Zimbabwe specifically and Africa generally. The syncretic narrative involves a process of “disruptive retranslation” (Huggan, 2001, p. 21), which locates the postcolonial agent as an “interpellated, already exist[ing] in a state of translation, imagined and reimagined by colonial ways of seeing” (Niranjana, 1992, p. 6). Tejaswini Niranjana (1992, p. 186) advances that the task of the translator (alternative theater practitioner) is “not to retrace the original—to reproduce the finer lineaments of an unblemished precolonial culture—but rather to intervene as a means of inscribing always-already fissured” cultures. To this end, syncretism in Africa could be viewed as marking the moment in which the Third World moved from an affiliative position with the Second and the First Worlds (Young, 1998)—as they existed.
Postindependence Zimbabwean Historical and Political Theater Context
At independence in 1980, Zimbabwean theater emerged fragmented. This fragmentation was due to ideological differences as highlighted by Owen Seda (2004), At independence [. . . ], the emergence of segregation, polarisation and division in Zimbabwean theatre was part of a residual consciousness of confrontation which had come out of the nationalist struggle on the one hand, and the tenacity of colonialist occupying forces on the other. (p. 137)
This residual consciousness manifested itself in the form of organizations that sought to safeguard and/or fight for their cultural and political space within the cultural industry in postindependence Zimbabwe. On one hand was the National Theatre Organisation (NTO), which controlled and administered colonial residual purpose-built theaters and independent funding for aligned theater companies in Zimbabwe. On the other hand, was the Zimbabwe Association of Community Theatre organisation (ZACT), which sought to mobilize community theater groups and create a counterstructure/movement to the NTO. Seda (2004) argues that ZACT was meant to promote new theatre in the townships, which theatre would assist the post-independence state in its quest to establish a just and egalitarian society. This theatre, founded on strong reliance on indigenous performance idioms, was supposed to go beyond mere voyeurism. It was meant to address society’s day-to-day developmental issues. (p. 138)
This township theater paradigm, considered alternative theater in this article, demanded its own performance spaces that would allow and enable the use of indigenous idioms, performance styles, and techniques. As a response to this need, township groups appropriated and repurposed community halls, beer gardens, open spaces, and youth centers into alternative performance spaces. One space that became a major alternative place of performance was Stanley Hall located in the oldest Bulawayo township, Makokoba. These appropriated performance spaces are important in developing a new sense of spatiality, appreciation of performance styles and esthetics in postindependence Zimbabwe because of their “locatedness” in the struggle against the domination and straightjacketing of the performance industry by the colonial residual Rhodesian theater tradition.
As Seda (2004) intimates above ZACT quickly abandoned its foundational principle of developing a new theater identity in Zimbabwe that was distinctly founded upon indigenous performance idioms. This change of heart was motivated by cross-cultural exchange programs initiated and funded by the Dutch-based Humanist Institute for Cooperation (Hivos). Hivos provided financial funding for international artists to work with township groups in Zimbabwe (Seda, 2004). These artists, often with the best intentions of knowledge and skills transfer, nevertheless became agents of Eurocentric cultural imperialism. Through collaborative work, these artists influenced esthetic practice, style of performance, and enforced the use of English as the medium of delivery in community theater performances. Indeed, true cultural collaboration is not always possible when the global systems of advantage (Tatum, 1997) still associate Africa with “primitiveness,” “lack of civilization,” and “underdevelopment.”
On one hand, some alternative theater practitioners were skeptical of supporting these cultural exchange programs and initiatives that trivialized their experiences and performance traditions. On the other hand, some took the opportunity to create sustainable relationships with their overseas partners who enriched their performance practice and esthetic development. One case in point is Amakhosi Theatre Productions who managed to create a working framework, through the NTO, with Christopher Weare, then Rhodes University Lecturer and Christopher Hurst 1 , a Central School of Speech and Drama graduate. The relationship between Chris Hurst and Amakhosi Theatre Productions resulted in the creation and performance of Workshop Negative (1986), the establishment and strengthening of Amakhosi Performing Arts Workshop 2 (APAW).
Notwithstanding the role played by ZACT in challenging the imposition of an imported realist colonial esthetic style, Ngugi wa Mirii and Kimani Gecau’s failure to contextualize and localize their Kenyan community theater experience and practice into the Zimbabwean theater landscape led to the organization’s (ZACT) demise. In contrast to the Kamiriithu Community Project (wa Mirii, 1979), Mirii’s ZACT was created and developed as a para-governmental project. As a result, most of ZACT’s programs were centralized in the Harare head office although there were provincial offices. Due to ZACT’s over reliance on government funding, the organization folded when the government cut off funding in 1986 (Byam, 1999). The disintegration of ZACT had a spiraling effect on the development of alternative theater practice within alternative performance spaces. Alternative theater groups lost focus as there was no centralized coordination of programs. Although the disintegration of ZACT resulted in the increase of the number of performances in communities as theater groups used every space available as a place of performance, they begun to misappropriate performance theories such as Grotowski’s (1968/1981) “poor theater” and “minimalism.”
ZACT’s failure to relate to other contending organizations such as the NTO resulted in a confrontational approach and frosty relations between the members of the two organizations. This meant that it was difficult for members of ZACT to work with NTO members thus hampering cross-pollination of ideas, skills, and paradigmatic practices. Cross-pollination mainly took place within NTO-affiliated theater groups such as Amakhosi Theatre Productions and Rooftop Promotions. When ZACT folded, member theater groups transformed into nongovernmental organizations (NGO), arts trusts, or switched to producing commissioned applied theater 3 projects. However, without proper financial administration training, these theater groups found themselves facing more challenges than opportunities.
The continued practice of theater along the NTO/ZACT divide in postindependence Zimbabwe led to the development of esthetic conventions associated with specific performance spaces. These conventions became the acceptable standards for performance and esthetic practice in postindependence Zimbabwe. Alternative performance spaces such as the Stanley Hall 4 and Theatre-in-the-Park 5 emerged within this setting and had to contest this cultural space. I argue that within this frame of contestation, the new performance practice that continues to develop within alternative performance spaces is a result of the confrontational relationship between the residual and dominant/emergent categories (Williams, 1977) on one hand and the reframing of spatial experience through performance in post-independence in Zimbabwe on the other.
Alternative Theater in Postcolonial Africa
There has been little consensus regarding the proper content, scope, and significance of alternative theater in Africa. Alternative theater has been defined in varying scopes and forms (Chikonzo, 2015; Kamlongera, 1989; Kerr, 1995; Leach, 2008; Mda, 1993; Nicholson, 2005; Ravengai, 2011a; Seda, 2004). 6 The common tenets identified by all these theorists include the “locatedness” of performances in the materiality of the people and/or community, syncretic and functional performances. Alternative theater is thus committed to telling the stories of its respective communities through contextually relevant cultural performative frames that challenge domination and exclusion. The performance styles and esthetic choices become a reflection of the influences of the larger community on the material; play development process, scenography, and presentation styles.
Alternative theater refers to the coalescence of all the varied theater-on-the-margins strands conceptualized by Peter Larlham (1985, p. 63) as committed theater. According to Larlham (1985), committed theater is concerned with social and political change; transformation and development of the people and communities where these theater groups come from and operate from. This commitment manifests itself in a multidisciplinary approach that allows a fluid relationship between professional conventional theater, other forms of social-based theater and indigenous traditional forms. The commitment of alternative theater practitioners transforms theater performances from utterances and self-conscious literary expressions to radical performed images of Black anger and resistance (Sitas, 1996;Steadman, 1994). The performative interactions in alternative theater refuse to imitate tribal performances, which were encouraged among migrant workers in the mines by the (colonial) government (Kruger, 1999), but present a sense of crafted history of power, of resistance, which does not collapse into a forced heroic rendition (Sitas, 1996). This reliance on the material conditions of the community and the strong commitment to social change hold solid linkages to Freire’s (1970/1993) model of praxis and social change identifiable with popular theater. I will now examine this idea of the “popular” and locate it within the frames of alternative theater.
Popular Theater as Alternative Theater
Theorists and practitioners have defined popular theater in various ways (Barber, 1997; Coplan, 1986; Fabian, 1978; Kamlongera, 1989; Kidd & Colletta, 1982; Steadman, 1986). It is a contemporary expression of “the people” that somehow sits between traditional and elite cultural manifestations (Barber, 1997). In attempting to answer the question, “what is African popular culture?”—and by extension theater—Johannes Fabian clarifies that it [a] [it] suggest[s] contemporary cultural expressions carried by the masses in contrast to both modern elitist and traditional “tribal” culture; [b] it evokes historical conditions characterized by mass communication, mass production, and mass participation; [c] it implies a challenge to accepted beliefs in the superiority of “pure” or “high” culture, but also to the notion of folklore, a categorization we have come to suspect as being equally elitist and tied to certain conditions in western society [and] [d] it signifies, potentially at least, processes occurring behind the back of established powers and accepted interpretations and, thus, offers a better conceptual approach to decolonization of which it is undoubtedly an important element. (1978, p. 315)
Popular culture is, thus, a hybrid cultural form that seeks to create a new world order in-between the “pure” and “high” cultures by challenging the status quo (Dolby, 2006); the fulcrum of the (African) people’s struggles. As performance, popular theater emerges as a syncretized paradigm of “low” and “high” cultural characteristics, which enhances the people’s sociopolitical, religious, and economic lives by challenging hegemony, domination, and prejudice (Dolby, 2006; Fabian, 1978; Young, 1998).
Popular theater has also been defined and distinguished from other forms of theater using “language and theatrical aesthetics” (Desai, 1990, p. 65). The distinction of popular theater based on language follows Ngugi wa Thiong’o’s (1986) relativist approach that a truly (African) popular theater should be presented and conducted in indigenous African languages. wa Thiong’o (1986) argued that any theater performance in foreign languages cater for an elite audience and therefore is “unAfrican.” In postcolonial Africa, syncretic dialects, which combined local languages with English/Portuguese and/or French, emerged as a counter to this indigenous relativism and metropolis-inspired elitism.
The theatrical esthetics argument largely surrounded spatial configuration, design, and space use. The space/place conceptualization continuum between the colonial/colonial residual and indigenous spatial paradigms due to the different philosophies and authorities meant that space and performance were imagined and understood differently. The imposition of the colonial spatial understanding on Third World 7 colonies motivated the development of a new spatial esthetic that was cognizant of the cultural, political, and philosophical perspectives. This new syncretic spatial understanding transformed and introduced new esthetic styles, approaches, and processes within the popular theater paradigm. The flexibility of popular theater practitioners to adapt and respond to the contemporary spatial and esthetic challenges positions this theater as a suitable strategy for social and human development. Furthermore, its adaptability enables it to respond contextually to creative needs of the “fluctuating conglomeration(s) of ethnic, regional, religious, and class groups” (Barber, 1987, p. 7). It is this malleability of popular theater that positions it as an alternative theatrical paradigm to the colonial/colonial residual and indigenous theater practice in Africa. According to Tony Bennett in Desai (1990, p. 66), popular theatre, as it is practized in Africa, ought to be thought of in relational and abstract terms, “as a site, always changing and variable in its constitution and organization.” This is due to the fact that alternative theater is always an elusive, ever-changing, and discursive practice susceptible to sociopolitical and economic influence (Desai, 1990).
As popular theater in Africa is typically socially engaged and responsive, applied theater genres such as theater for development (Mda, 1993) would also be described as popular. Thus, while other theaters may be popular, not all popular theater is the same. In Williams’s (1977) social culture framework, alternative theater belongs to the emergent cultural category. It is important to note that the transformations and changes that create alternative theater must take place within conventional performance practice models. Accordingly, in the African context, the functional and normative dimensions of performance are fundamental characteristics that should be used to define alternative theater performances.
Tim Prentki, and Jan Selman (2000) define popular theater as a process of theatre which deeply involves specific communities in identifying issues of concern, analysing current conditions and causes of a situation, identifying points of change and analysing how change could happen and/or contributing to the actions implied. (p. 8)
In other words, alternative theater can be best thought of as a normative discursive practice that engages in dialogues through theatrical practices. As Desai (1990) observes, alternative theater is never in an exclusively advantaged position, rather constantly negotiates and renegotiates its own articulations in the larger societal context as it challenges hegemony, domination, and the status quo. These negotiations, which are moderated by the materiality of the community, influence the esthetic approaches and processes as well as content development. The net outcome of this negotiation is an embodied and collaborative esthetic development processes.
Theater enterprise operates within conventions (Coplan, 1986; Kamlongera, 1989). This means that alternative theater in postindependence Zimbabwe needed to create and develop conventions that would moderate the reception of the cultural products performed in alternative theater spaces. As a “counter-culture” to the mainstream residual paradigm, the alternative theater basic convention followed an endogenous or bottom-up approach, which recognized the creative potentials of the people, their worldview, cultural background, and experiences, and the necessity to engage them in active participation [through spectatorship and member checking] to chart the course of their collective destiny. (Chukwu-Okoronkwo, 2012, p. 692)
These characteristics of the alternative culture define the relationship between performance style and alternative places of performance. I use Chukwu-Okoronkwo’s (2012) observation to distinguish alternative spaces of performance such as Stanley Hall and Theatre-in-the-Park as alternative culture to the colonial residual tradition in Zimbabwe and the new nationalist theater, which was propped up by the ZANU-PF regime at the onset of independence. The importance of Stanley Hall in the history of the political and cultural struggles of Bulawayo strengthens the argument above as it invokes the spirit of uncorrupted liberation struggle. Therefore, I argue that alternative performance spaces hold a fundamental position in the development and growth of theater practice in postindependence Zimbabwe.
The physical nurture of theater practice especially emerging in Bulawayo’s townships is largely attributable to Stanley Hall as a space. Stanley Hall was used a space for Karate training and practice by Dragons Karate Club in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Dragons Karate Club was a collective of young people coming from Makokoba, Nguboyenja, and Mzilikazi under the tutelage of Cont Mhlanga. When Cont Mhlanga and crew decided to form a theater company in 1981, Stanely Hall became the center of performance for Amakhosi Theatre Productions and other emerging Bulawayo groups. Because this space had been inscribed with physical performances linked inspired by Karate and kung-fu disciplines, theater performances thus adopted the same. This physical approach to theater performance characterized Amakhosi Theatre Productions’ plays such as Diamond Warrior I (1980) and II (1981), Nansi Lendoda [Here is the man] (1985) and Workshop Negative (1986) among others. Although the physicality of Amakhosi Theatre Productions’ performances could be attributed to their Karate background, it is important also to attribute the inscribed influences of Stanley Hall as these are important in determining the horizon of expectation.
Christopher Kamlongera (1989) provides valuable insights into the understanding of alternative theater in Africa. He conceives alternative theater as African theater with two central tenets, [a] The practitioner is re-educating himself into understanding theatre language and material relevant for the community, [b] the theatre practitioner is opening up dialogue with the community in order for them to join hands in creating a true African theatre. (Kamlongera, 1989, p. 83)
What Kamlongera is advocating here is an “unlearning” that is necessary for African theater practitioners who have undergone colonial education. An education that not only privileges Western knowledge and Western theatrical paradigms, but also relegates indigenous performance to primitive ritual. What Kamlongera is advocating is a syncretic theater that is relevant and responsive to the African populace both materially and conceptually. Consequently, alternative performance provides the space for a new theater language to emerge defining a relevant contemporary African esthetic interpretive model. Just as
The fact that alternative theater is embedded in the community creates a struggle between the power of performance in the arts and the performance of power by the state (wa Thiongo, 1997, p. 11). In other terms, these enactments of power are a fight to control popular cultural modes of expression and connections that exist between the status quo and alternative theater practitioners. The struggle between these two contending spheres of influence observed by wa Thiongo are about validating and bestowing recognition and prestige (Huggan, 2001) on alternative theater practice and performance spaces in postindependence Zimbabwe. Alternative performances (and by extension alternative spaces of performance) are thus, a strategy of exposing material struggle, symbolic power and resistance against and between disciplines of authorship, authenticity, and legitimacy discharged in the interconnected levels of mediation within the political Zimbabwean state. Furthermore, the attachment of symbolic power to alternative performance space makes the performances hosted in these places of performance political. The alternative practitioner’s adoption of everyday street language, clothes as costumes and household utensils as properties demonstrates a counterhegemonic popular resistance and radically alters the residual colonial semiotic appreciation of costumes, sets, and properties. This new semiotic value in alternative performances forms the foundation of—and legitimates—an African theory of scenography.
Alternative Performance Space
Within the post-independence Zimbabwean theater industry, dominant and emergent places of performance include revolutionary spaces constructed within the mythologies of the dominant. These spaces developed as part of the revolution against the exclusionary policies that frustrated the African performance narrative by what Samuel Ravengai (2006) calls the “second generation” practitioners. Within the discourse of performance studies, debates and arguments have emerged as to what the term “theater” refers to. In the Western theater paradigm, the term “theater” was used to denote the architectural structure in which theatrical performances were watched (Brocket & Hildy, 1999); the theatrical performance presented and the profession itself (Crow, 1983). This demonstrates how the space, the activity, and the industry within the Western trajectory of theater are inextricably intertwined. Although there is now consensus on the definition of a theatrical performance from an African perspective (Banham, 2004; Kamlongera989), the debate around what constitutes a “theater” structure within the cultural industry continues.
This debate revolves around the spatial configurations of this space called a “theatre.” In the Zimbabwean context, the term “theatre” is used to refer to the residual British colonial purpose-built performance spaces. Thus, in this article, a “theatre” identifies with well-resourced colonial purpose-built spaces that seek to perpetuate the colonial Rhodesian theater tradition concerned with “wanting-to-be-like-the-West” (Mda, 1993, p. 39). Consequently, to understand places of performance used by alternative theater practitioners, I adopt the term performance space rather than theater.
The conceptualization of performance spaces in this manner enables me, as a researcher and Zimbabwean scenographer, to consider any place used for performance ranging from open spaces, street corners, disused buildings, galleries, markets, and cultural centers as sites of performance. Furthermore, positioning performance spaces in this manner dismantles the colonial/colonial residual-indigenous spatial continuum. The colonial/colonial residual conceptualization of performance space in rigid physical three-dimensional terms (height, depth, and width) that distinctly separate the stage and auditorium created challenges for indigenous performance styles. In the same way, the fluid and dynamic expression of spatial experience hinged on time/history (wa Thiongo, 1997) was problematic for the mechanical European expression of the political, social, and ideological perspectives through space. Although this conceptual position of (alternative) performance space dismantles the African/unAfrican binary, it also challenges the prevailing hegemonies around performance, space, and theater production, which were part of the colonial project and continue to be exported through cultural imperialism. What distinguishes different paradigmatic approaches to performance, space, theater and how alternative theater dismantles colonial constructs remains fundamental in the characterization of spatiality in Africa.
Alternative performance spaces, thus, refer to found spaces (Mackintosh, 1999), empty spaces (Brook 1968/1996), industrial spaces (Wilke, 2004), and open spaces/yards (Balme, 1999; Gibbons, 1979; wa Thiongo, 1997). Found spaces include unconventional spaces where (alternative) theater performances take place. Alternative performance spaces are thus, framed as spaces that are repurposed and temporarily transformed into places of performance. They may be newly built multipurpose hybrid places of performance that borrow architectural design, spatial arrangement, and usage from both the indigenous and residual colonial Rhodesian performance paradigm. They also include open spaces such as streets, bus terminals and village centers, with dormitory entrances and exits.
The industrial/empty space/yard and/or open space allow alternative theater practitioners to reconfigure and create a spatial synthesis of diverse influences of types of theater-in-the-round reflecting elements of a number of Third World cultural texts (Balme 1999). According to Balme (1999, p. 233) the streets are the arena where carnival and other ceremonial processions and festivals unfold; “they form therefore almost the quintessential place of encounter and performance,” which reflects the idea of the storyteller with his or her audience gathered around. The yard refers to the back yards of urban slums (and high-density townships), which form a gathering place for the local people (Balme, 1999). These alternative spatialities, therefore, transform the interaction taking place to a level of theatricality absent from purpose-built colonial/colonial residual spaces.
In addition, I consider these performance spaces alternative because they are multipurpose. They can be used for a variety of performances ranging from music, dance, theater, and book exhibitions providing an inner and outer performance space that permits a flexible spatial arrangement incorporating rather than separating the audience (Balme, 1999; Gibbons, 1979). The incorporation of the spectators into the performance event is an attempt by alternative practitioners to “get rid of the look, gaze, dissolving perception into performance” (Blau, 1990, p. 281). This dissolution of the gaze results in a carnivalesque atmosphere characteristic of Zimbabwean indigenous performance traditions. At this point, the performance becomes a “social event” (Schechner, 1994, p. 40) and transgresses the Aristotelian self-contained and autonomous artistic structure made of beginning-middle and an end. Esthetically, interpretive methods and approaches change as the performance is transformed into a social engagement and its living personality comes to life (Howard, 2002).
It is important to note that the “colonial residual theatre tradition” is used here to refer to the realist performance style imported from England by white settler Rhodesians (Ravengai, 2011b), who resisted to culturally and socially assimilate their Rhodesian culture with indigenous performance forms. Although “Rhodesian theatre” may bear similarities to British theater, its context makes it colonial—a nostalgic imitation (Ravengai, 2011b; Steadman, 1994). This Rhodesian theater tradition facilitated the building of purpose-built proscenium arch spaces such the Harare Repertory Theatre, Bulawayo Theatre, Charles Austin Theatre, and Courtauld Theatre to cement its performance conventions.
In postindependence Zimbabwe, alternative performance spaces emerged out of the demand for places of performance by the increasing number of community-based performing groups. Theater groups motivated by the government’s push for an African centered performative narrative cognizant of the cultural life of “new” Zimbabwe (Chifunyise, 1997) moved into civic, cultural, and open spaces in their communities. Thus, during the first two decades of political independence, the Bulawayo City Council’s (BCC) Stanley Hall and Rooftop Promotion’s Theatre-in-the-Park emerged as major alternative performance spaces for the growing list of township groups. These alternative performance spaces became “sites of physical, social and psychic forces” (wa Thiongo, 1997, p. 13) as they were used to spatially express the state of being in postindependence Zimbabwe.
Alternative production houses such as Amakhosi Theatre Productions found themselves cut out of purpose built spaces because their presentational esthetics and approaches did not match the stringent straightjacketed and mechanical colonial/residual style coordinated by National Theatre Association (Seda, 2004). As a result any other theater performance outside the formal purpose-built space was framed as informal or “village” theater performance (Interview John Bonney February 2, 2015). This was a continuation of the positioning of performance space as private spaces for the enjoyment of cultural performances. In colonial Zimbabwe, it was this “theater” performed in purpose-built spaces that became a yard stick for qualifying a performance as “professional” or village theater. It is in this context where Amakhosi Theatre Productions and Rooftop Promotions challenge the spatial performance narrative through borrowing “authentic images of African reality [. . .] derive[d] from [African] symbols and values of mythology” (Soyinka in Balme, 1999, p. 43) to create a syncretic alternative performance spaces that inform practice.
The conceptualization of alternative performance spaces as found spaces finds resonance with a number of African theater theorists who challenged the building of national theaters in Africa along “international” (read as Western) style over and above indigenous spatial concepts (Etherton & Magyer, 1981;Gilbert & Tompkins, 1996; Kerr, 1995; wa Thiongo, 1997). Christopher Balme (1999) argues that the “very act of constructing a building for the performance of theatre is questionable in light of [African] indigenous spatial practices” (p. 228). This call was motivated by the realization that the spatial and architectural configurations of the colonial residual purpose-built performance spaces are radically divorced from the carnival indigenous performances that contributed a larger number of performances in post-independence Zimbabwe (Ravengai, 2011a). The desire by alternative theater practitioners to use performance spaces that are spatially and esthetically relevant to their work and sociocultural context resulted in the appropriation and repurposing of colonial relic spaces into hybrid places of performance. These syncretic performance spaces had a combination of colonial and indigenous spatial characteristics.
Commenting on the newly built national theater in Uganda, Soyinka (1988) records, We heard of the existence of a National Theatre and ran to it full of joy and anticipation. We discovered that there was no theatre, there was nothing beyond a precious, attractive building in the town centre [. . .] it was discomforting to find a miniature replica of a British provincial theatre. (p. 4)
Soyinka’s disappointment is reflective of the challenges created by the nationalist liberation ideology that characterized independent African countries at that time. Although Africa sought to chart a new path away from the traditional Western model, she did not have the resources, technical know-how, and possibly confidence to do so on her own. The net result was a situation where colonial metropolis continued to design, finance and build performance spaces that alienated alternative practitioners’ resident in postindependence Africa. As the new national theaters and colonial residual spaces were inappropriate for the new dramaturgical ideas in Africa, alternative theater practitioners searched for adaptable spaces where the spectator–performer interaction was liberated (Balme, 1999; Komlongera, 1989; wa Thiongo, 1997). These adaptable spaces are what I call alternative performance spaces.
From this foregoing discussion, it is clear that the spatial debate between the First World and Third World countries is centered on the quadratic-circular spatial dichotomy (Ambe, 2007; Balme, 1999; Gibbons, 1979; Soyinka,988). The quadratic frame manifests itself as a proscenium arch within the Anglo centric paradigm, whereas the circular emerges as a theater-in-the-round within the Third World theater practice. It is here that Soyinka’s (1988) frustration and this paper’s engagement of the politics of space lies. Although within the broadly Western concept of theater 9 , a purpose-built performance space is specifically set aside for dramatic and theatrical performances, in the African set-up, performance spaces occupy the liminal space between ritual (imagined) and modern theater (physical) performance (Balme, 1999).
Returning to Mackintosh’s (1999) conceptualization of found spaces in Britain as alternative performances spaces, it is important to note that the architectural reorganization and restructuring of these disused spaces into alternative performance spaces is left in the hands of whoever is using them, scenographers included. In the African/Zimbabwean context, this restructuring and reconfiguration is done by repurposing and appropriating indigenous and colonial/colonial residual spatial designs. The syncretic spaces that emerge navigate performance practice and institute new esthetic conventions. As Seda (2011, p. 173) observes, a performance space provides a context of interpretation for spectators and performers, in postindependence Zimbabwe the hybrid alternative places of performance introduced new ways of appreciating and interpreting esthetic designs.
Although Wonderful Bere (1999) considers the notion of found spaces as oppositional to that of purpose-built sites in postindependence Zimbabwe, the positioning of nonconventional spaces, framed as alternative performance spaces, in a binary stance to conventional purpose-built spaces, foregrounds the colonial residual position of identifying performance spaces through distinct architectures and physical buildings. I argue that this approach essentializes alternative performance spaces as the “Other” (Said, 1978), rather than the alternate, the periphery rather than part of the center (hooks, 1994). This reflects the difficulty that practitioners and theoreticians face when attempting to describe or categorize “African” performance space in a globalized world. Open spaces used in ceremonial (theatrical) performances such as
Conclusion
In this article, I characterized alternative theater and alternative performance space as fundamental concepts, in practice and theory, in understanding postcolonial theater practice especially in Zimbabwe. The syncretic nurture of alternative theater practice necessitates a transformation of the colonial relic spaces into alternative performance spaces providing the desired spatiality for the performance and audience engagement. This syncretism expressed through alternative performances and the transformation of colonial relics into alternative places of performances is a result of the postcolonial condition of being Zimbabwean.
Footnotes
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
