PLURALITIES

The cluster PLURALITIES seeks to explore issues related to the dynamics of the Performing Arts and Cinema, influenced by the increasing mobility of cultural elements and human beings as carriers of culture. We are specifically interested in the question of cultural diversity and its impact on the structure, institutions, agents, and content of Performing Arts and Cinema.

In a world which is deeply connected on so many levels, culture is no longer one nation’s exclusive apanage, moving across borders with people and through the Internet. Every art influenced by culture has been touched by globalization. The field of Performing Arts and Cinema itself has expanded to accommodate the changes our contemporaneity is going through.  

In the past, there were times when culture at an international level meant a dichotomy between East and West, tradition and modernity, past and future, when certain cultures were exotic and others were the norm. As viewing the world in binaries reduces the beautiful dynamic that exists, we refute these perspectives and welcome researchers, artists and professionals who seek to bring to light how Performing Arts and Cinema were and are metamorphosed through cultural diversity. By cultural diversity, we understand the following two meanings: 1) the sum of all the different cultures in the world; 2) the existence of various cultural groups within a community.

To facilitate the dialogue within the cluster, we consider it useful to bring together contributions around three axes, which make it possible to qualify the meanings of cultural diversity as reflected by the Performing Arts and Cinema. 

The aim of the first axis is to offer an overview of the cultural diversity of the Performing Arts and Cinema on a global level, by accepting pieces that speak of/reveal the cultural characteristics of theater, dance, cinema of different countries.

The second axis is concerned with the ways in which elements of two or several different cultures are valued by means of metamorphosis, transposition, reinterpretation, within Performing Arts and Cinema.

Finally, a third axis is devoted to representations of artists from different classes, ethnicities, genders, ages in the various Performing Arts and Cinema and to the role these arts play in educating their audience and challenging power structures. It is within this axis that we consider it opportune to also discuss the emergence of public policies related to diversity in this field of the arts.