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About this book
Engaging Audiences asks what cognitive science can teach scholars of theatre studies about spectator response in the theatre. Bruce McConachie introduces insights from neuroscience and evolutionary theory to examine the dynamics of conscious attention, empathy and memory in theatre goers.
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Table of contents (5 chapters)
Reviews
'Armed with a deep knowledge of the history of spectatorship, McConachie constructively engages with the recent findings of cognitive scientists to challenge fundamental assumptions about how and why we view and recall theatrical events. The result is a thoughtful, readable, and provocative work with important implications for critical theory, historiography, and production.' - John Emigh, Professor of Theatre, Speech, and Dance and of English, Brown University
'Engaging Audiences provides a major synthesis of theatre/performance and cognitive studies. McConachie finds just the right balance between scientific details and theatrical examples.' - Philosophy and Literature
'In its formidable combination of clarity, engagement, and rigour, it present[s] a persuasive case that theatre and performance studies should pay more attention to the workings of the mind...A landmark in both theatre history and theories of audience reception.' - Theatre Research International
About the author
BRUCE McOCNACHIE is Professor and Chair of Theatre Arts and Performance Studies, University of Pittsburgh, USA.
Bibliographic Information
Book Title: Engaging Audiences
Book Subtitle: A Cognitive Approach to Spectating in the Theatre
Authors: Bruce McConachie
Series Title: Cognitive Studies in Literature and Performance
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230617025
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan New York
eBook Packages: Palgrave Literature & Performing Arts Collection, Literature, Cultural and Media Studies (R0)
Copyright Information: Bruce McConachie 2008
Hardcover ISBN: 978-0-230-60988-4Published: 12 December 2008
Softcover ISBN: 978-0-230-11673-3Published: 15 August 2011
eBook ISBN: 978-0-230-61702-5Published: 24 November 2008
Series ISSN: 2945-7297
Series E-ISSN: 2945-7300
Edition Number: 1
Number of Pages: IX, 248
Topics: Performing Arts, Literature, general, Theatre History, Theatre and Performance Studies, Neuropsychology, Media Studies