Drama, Politics, and Evolution (eBook)

This book outlines the evolution of our political nature over two million years and explores many of the rituals, plays, films, and other performances that gave voice and legitimacy to various political regimes in our species' history. Our genetic and cultural evolution during the Pleistocene Epoch bestowed a wide range of predispositions on our species that continue to shape the politics we support and the performances we enjoy. The book's case studies range from an initiation ritual in the Mbendjela tribe in the Congo to a 1947 drama by Bertolt Brecht and include a popular puppet play in Tokugawa Japan. A final section examines the gradual disintegration of social cohesion underlying the rise of polarized politics in the USA after 1965, as such films as The Godfather, Independence Day, The Dark Knight Rises, and Joker accelerated the nation's slide toward authoritarian Trumpism.


Since retiring from the University of Pittsburgh, Bruce McConachie has published Theatre Histories: An Introduction (3^rd edn) with three co-authors and The Routledge Companion to Theatre, Performance and Cognitive Science, co-authored with Rick Kemp.  Previous single-authored books include: Melodramatic Formations: American Theatre and Society, 1820-1870 (1992), American Theatre in the Culture of the Cold War (2003), Engaging Audiences: A Cognitive Approach to Spectating in the Theatre (2008), Theatre and Mind (2013), and Evolution, Cognition, and Performance (2015).  A past President of the American Society for Theatre Research, he also continues to serve as an editor and reader for several academic publishers.