| Title | 19. Hyphenated Thinking in Performance Processes |
|---|---|
| Subtitle | Thinking through Performance-pedagogical Entanglements with More-than-human Matter |
| Contributor | Christel Stalpaert(author) |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.11647/obp.0469.19 |
| Landing page | https://www.openbookpublishers.com/books/10.11647/obp.0469/chapters/10.11647/obp.0469.19 |
| License | https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ |
| Copyright | Christel Stalpaert |
| Publisher | Open Book Publishers |
| Published on | 2025-10-24 |
| Long abstract | Building on new materialist and decolonial writings, performance philosopher Christel Stalpaert coined the term ‘hyphenated thinking’ in performance studies: the resurgence of knowledge in relationality and across multispecies, interweaving cultures, disciplines, and fields of study (art, science, and activism). She rehearses this epistemology with university students in close collaboration with performance artists. In this contribution she demonstrates a practice of hyphenated thinking through her long-term commitment with Natural Contract Lab and their ephemeral performance process STILL HERE—An Alliance of Care for the SZenne River (2023-). In co-creation with scientists, artists, activists, local stakeholders, and participants, the Natural Contract Lab group seeks to trace hydro-(ecological) matters of concern and to fabulate justice to compensate for the harm inflicted by ecocide on the hydro commons. The artistic practices of walking-with, sensory mapping, storying, Agoras, andGuardian Schools activate pluriversal and collaborative modes of knowledge production. Stalpaert describes the particular outcome of the research method of a hyphenated thinking in the university context of the arts department at Ghent university: as a way for unlearning eurocentric and anthropocentric modes of knowledge production. |
| Page range | pp. 413–438 |
| Print length | 26 pages |
| Language | English (Original) |
Christel Stalpaert is Senior Full Professor at the Department of Art History, Musicology and Theatre Studies at Ghent University (Belgium). She is director of the research centre S:PAM (Studies in Performing Arts and Media) and co-founder of the FWO-funded research network CoDa (Cultures of Dance). She was a Distinguished Visitor at the University of Alberta (Edmonton, Canada) in 2023 and publishes widely in the field, in journals such as Performance Research and The Drama Review. She recently published Performance and Posthumanism (with van Baarle and Karreman, Palgrave 2021) and Violence and Trauma in Contemporary Performance (with Sofie de Smet, Marieke Breyne, and Pedzisai Maedza, Leuven University Press, 2025), and co-edited the volume ‘On Activation’ with Eylül Fidan Akıncı for Performance Research (2023)28:8. She is currently writing her monograph on Hyphenated Thinking: Performance (Studies) Activating Ecological Encounters.