Poetic Exploration of the East and the West in Ping Chong’s Pojagi

Lee, Gang-Im(이강임) 한국동서비교문학학회 2006 동서 비교문학저널 Vol.0 No.15

셰익스피어(shakespeare)의 사랑과 전쟁 -인지연구(cognitive studies)를 통해 다시 듣는 셰익스피어의 사랑이야기-

이강임 ( Gang Im Lee ) 한국연극교육학회 2015 연극교육연구 Vol.26 No.-

In this paper, I deal with Shakespeare`s romantic love and marriage through《Romeo and Juliet》,《A Mid-summer Night`s Dream》,《Othello》, and《The Winter`s Tale》. I consider that these stories on romantic love and marriage belong not only to his age but also to our time. As a keen observer of nature including our bodies, Shakespeare seems to grasp the meaning of romantic love and marriage as a natural principle, which is as essential as life itself. I am looking at Shakespeare`s texts as meeting places between Shakespeare`s mind(brain) and our mind(brain), eliciting cognition and empathy regarding romantic love and marriage. In regard to methodological tools, I adopt cognitive approaches based on cognitive studies such as cognitive linguistics, cognitive anthropology, and cognitive psychology because cognitive studies provide a rich body of resources and references about body, language, and biology necessary to unlock the meaning of human action called ``copulation behavior.`` According to evolutionary cognitive anthropology, romantic love and marriage is our brain`s setting gained through human evolution, enabling preservation and abundance of human race. I refer to cognitive psychologist David Buss` and cognitive anthropologist Helen Fisher`s scientific exploration and analysis regarding romantic love and marriage. Buss` book『Evolutionary Psychology』 and Fisher`s seminary book『Why we love』 give us insights on romantic love and marriage as life`s evolution. Meanwhile, I borrow Mark Turner`s cognitive linguistic concept called ``conceptual blending`` in order to illuminate Shakespeare`s art of language. In《Romeo and Juliet》, I focus on the conceptual blending between love and death, examining the nature of love as fatal as death. Metaphors of a wedding bed, a grave, and a sword offer us a powerful image about romantic love and marriage. In《A Mid-summer Night`s Dream》, I look at the poisonous side of romantic love making people see only his or her lover. According to cognitive science, brains of people in love are same with those of people using Cocaine. Magic poison is a key concept which is blended with love. Fisher explains that through this love poison lovers produce passion to live together while raising their offsprings. 《Othello》is read through the love-jealousy-murder of Othello. Through 《Othello》, Shakespeare seems to point the monstrous phenomenon of love-jealousy leading to the murder of a lover. In《Othello》, love is portrayed as a ``blue monster.`` While《Othello》deals with the tragic outcome of love-jealousy, one of Shakespeare`s late play,《The Winter`s Tale》tells us the way of forgiveness through love. Hermione`s return from her statue produces the image of rebirth which makes the sin of Leontes forgiven. In《The Winter`s Tale》Shakespeare suggests the possibility of forgiveness as a powerful means of love.

희극과 여성의 문제 -윌리암 셰익스피어의 『십이야』와 아프라 벤의 『떠돌이』를 중심으로

이강임 ( Lee Gang Im ) 한국연극교육학회 2016 연극교육연구 Vol.28 No.-

There is a long history of gender-specific discourses on genre, especially on comedy, which is the topic of this paper. More often than not, Shakespearean female representation in comedy has been related to feminism. But, in many Shakespearean comedies, the feminine rebels against the masculine social order during holidays but returns to masculine ordinary life in the end in the form of wedding. Men writers like Shakespeare create the feminine other from the standpoints of the masculine self. Comedy was exclusively a male genre until women writers like Aphra Behn attempted to subvert the very gender-specific signature inscribed by the male authors, even though Behn was sometimes accused of using male conventions. In regard to the issue of Behn``s comedy and feminism, I examine how Behn overthrows convention within the framework of conventional comedy. In this paper, I look on the issue of comedy, sex, sexuality, gender, reproduction, and feminism. For this purpose, I use the sample performance texts such as William Shakespeare``s 『Twelfth Night』 and Aphra Behn``s 『The Rover』. Especially, I illuminate the performative dimensions and stage conventions of Elizabethan theatre and restoration drama against which Shakespeare and Behn wrote their comedies. The actual presence of the boy-actresses in Elizabethan era and the first English actresses in restoration period are two main focuses of my discussion.

번역극 연출: 몸을 통한 문화 번역 -데이비드 매밋의 ≪올리아나(Oleanna)≫ 말-제스처 문화 번역 사례 연구-

이강임 ( Lee Gang-im ) 한국연극교육학회 2017 연극교육연구 Vol.31 No.-

In this paper, I deal with the embodied process of cultural translation during the course of making the performance text of a foreign play. Upon the scientific bases of cognitive studies, regarding foreign plays, I illuminate how the director can embody the cultural meanings through the body of the actors. I call this process ‘cultural translation through the body,’ discriminating from the textual translation process. Methodologically, from the perspectives of Enactivism, I adopt the concept of ‘enaction’ as the process of meaning making. In the first part, I deploy the issues of text, the body-mind, the world, and the meaning. In the second part, therefore, as the main theme of this paper, I focus on the technical processes of the cultural transition between the source culture and the target culture. For this purpose, I rely on such system theories as Dynamical System Theory, Theory of Mind, and Mead's Loop hypothesis(image-language-thought link), applying these theories into the linguistic process of embodied communication. On behalf of Dynamical System, language does not stand alone without the body, not being a closed system of symbols and ideas. Our bodies communicate with the environments and other people through the structural coupling. Multimodality of our thought is performed through the speech-gesture coupling. In this context, ‘cultural translation through the body’ is the technique to find the matching unit of the speech-gesture between the source culture and the target culture. Experiments and studies of gesture and facial expression done by Adam Kendon, David McNeill, and Paul Ekman provide a bunch of knowledge about the performance of the body. In the last part, I apply this technique of ‘the cultural translation through the body’ into the actual processes of cultural translation in the sampling case of David Mamet‘s 『Oleanna』. I reconstrct the processes of making the performance text of 『Oleanna』, showing how I proceeded the embodiment of meaning through the making of the translated speech-gesture unit. On the working rehearsal stage, as the director, I tried the simulation of the actual performance as many as I could, discussing the cultural issues of meaning making with the artists, staff members, and the invited professionals and students participated in the pre-performance. Through this preparation, I could make the coupling of the source culture with the target culture, enacting the meaning of the production.

겸손한 목격자의 유쾌한 대꾸하기 - 체화된 페미니즘들로 살펴본 퀴어 퍼포먼스 연구 -

이강임 ( Lee Gang Im ) 한국연극교육학회 2019 연극교육연구 Vol.35 No.-

This paper discusses on the topic of jolly feminism’s speaking back to the normatic authority called ‘the phallus,’ which constructs the biopolitical frame of ‘the protecting Man and the protected Woman.’ Methodologically, I examine the issues related to the topic in regard to the perspectives of embodied feminism, such as Judith Butler’s postmodern feminism, Ann Fausto-Sterling’s neurofeminism, and Donna Haraway’s technofeminism. I study the topic of ‘doing gender,’ ‘gender trouble,’ and ‘undoing gender’ from the level of gene to the philosophical meaning of recognition and love. In the introduction, I explain key concepts of embodied feminism, like gender trouble, gender undoing, body as nature’s construction, body as continuum, the myth of gene(gender), postgender, posthuman, and the female Man. In the main part of this paper, first, I draw the outline of embodied feminisms, regarding the issues of ‘sex,’ ‘gender,’ ‘sexuality,’ and bimodality of the body. I see gender as a continuum and fluidity, which permits the transportation and the transformation of the body. Second, I bring forth the idea of speaking back from the gender ‘monster’ as a jolly queer witness of our posthuman conditions and predicaments. Third, as the case studies, I select three queer performance pieces, American Lesbian Theatre Group Split Britches’ < Belle Reprieve, 1990 > and < Menopausal Gentleman, 1997 >, and transsexual performance artist Kate Bornstein’s < Hidden/A Gender >. In these pieces, I illuminate the theme of ‘gender trouble and gender undoing,’ which constructs and deconstructs the normative binary gender frame, Woman/Man. Using the figure of the female man(the female man©), I show how the jolly queer artists dismantle the binary system of gender in its form of pureness and oneness. In these performances, the acts of trans transpire across the hard line of the normative binary system, leading to a new kind of sexual identification. In < Belle reprieve, 1990 > and < Menopausal Gentleman,1997 >, the queer artists as the female man demands recognition, life, love. In < Hidden/A Gender >, the binary normative sex/gender system is playfully accused for doing harms to transgenders and intersexes. The ethical and economical predicaments of the queers are narrated through the figure of the female man©. In the last part, I suggest the jolly feminist’s way of speaking back is very useful to deal with the sexist representaion of the sexed bodies and the gender politics in the real world.

욕망의 헤테로토피아 건축하기-사라 룰의 <옆방에서 혹은 바이브레이터 플레이> 수행적 공간 연출-

이강임 ( Lee Gang-im ) 한국연극교육학회 2020 연극교육연구 Vol.37 No.-

It is fairly necessary for the theatre director to conceive what the theatre space for the work in planning would like to be. Furthermore, conceiving theatre space is the first and basic tool to embody the work in process. Therefore, time-space matter has been the very important issue in the academic field of performance studies. Since the concept of time-space is also based on our very subjective and individual experience, it is a fact that the researchers have had a hard time in dealing with time and space in performance studies. For the author of this paper, as a theatre director and a scholar, I have been searching for the materials about theatre and time-space, but I have not found much resources for that matter. I had tried to illuminate time-space matter from the perspectives of performance studied in a paper titled 「performance space directing: focused on the performativity of space」. As for that paper, I explained the concept of performativity of theatre space, but I could not have a scholarly achievement in examining how the director in focus conceived the theatre space in detail. In that paper, I borrowed the concept of performativity defined by Judith Butler, stating that “in social space like theatre space, space does not express the real relationship and identity, but space itself is the very process in which the relationships and identifications are produced.” As a continuing project of the earlier paper, in this paper, not only I delve into the peformative quality of space, but also I apply the very concept of performative space to my own directing work, Sarah Ruhl’s < In the Next Room or the Vibrator Play > in 2017. My thesis is that social space like theatre space is not an empty container, but a site in which the very complex social relations and differences like ‘gender,’ ‘class,’ and ‘race’ cross and overlap. In this paper, using interdisplinary research method of performace studies, I try to look at the various concepts about space which inspired me to conceive theatre space for Sarah Ruhl’s < In the Next Room or the Vibrator Play >. The scholars and practitioners like Doreen Massey, Henri Lefevre, Jacques Rancière, Elizabeth Grosz, bell hooks, Luce Irigaray, Zaha Hadid offered me huge insights about the concept of time-space. Conclusively, I define performative space directng as image cartography. Through my discussion of space directing as image cartography, I talk about the desired images of house, home, sexuality, and love in Sarah Ruhl’s < In the Next Room or the Vibrator Play >. Using the diverse theoretical backgrounds in this practical paper, I suggest the model of both theoretical and practical paper.

연출가의 파트너: 관극 체험의 주체로서의 관객 -공연 연출과 인지적 관객 행동론-

이강임 ( Gang Im Lee ) 한국연극학회 2011 한국연극학 Vol.1 No.44

For a long time, theatre scholars and practitioners have been talking about the constituents of a performance from the aspects of production. The receiver of the production has rarely been focused in the discourses of creation in theatre arts. In the dominant theatrical convention of the naturalist theatre, the spacial separation between the producer and the spectator brought forth the practical separation between the doer and the receiver. In a darkened auditorium, immobile and passive, the spectator merely views the performance, receiving the message of the production manufactured by the creators of the production. Following this line of thoughts, in the very concept of the spectator, immobility and passivity have been deeply embedded. If different in degree, such innovative directors as Antonin Artaud, Bertold Brecht, Jerzy Grotowski, Peter Brook, Ariane Mnouchukin, and Augusto Boal altogether problematized the naturalist convention of spectatorship, proposing the concept of ``the productive and participatory`` spectator. In this paper, I deliberately consider what the spectator does during and after the performance. Is the spectator the passive viewer of a performance? Can we think of the spectator as the creator of the meaning of the performance even though s/he does nothing? As a practitioner, while I have been involved in making productions, my interests in spectatiorship have been gradually increased. I often asked myself, who is the spectator, then? In this paper, I look into the nature of spectatorship, suggesting the double concept of creator-watcher as the figure of the spectator. Semioticians and psychoanalysists approach the relationship between the producer and the spectator of the theatre from the text-centered semiology. They propose that as the consumer of the theatre the spectator reads the performance text and extracts meaning of it. Is that so? From our experience, we know that we hardly converts the vivid images and material sources on stage into signs. While we watch a performance, we actually in the flow of the performance. Primarily, from the cognitive sense of viewing, I regard the spectator as the actual doer. As the agency, the spectator constructs the meaning of a performance in the process of experiencing the performance. As Marie-Madeleine Mervant-Roux has put it, the spectator is a great resonator. In this paper, I adopt the theoretical frames and discoveries offered from the area of cognitive studies, examining the cognitive actions of the spectator. It is worth mentioning that the cognitive theoretical frames that I picked up should be complemented with the perspectives of cultural studies. Viewing is not only an individual cognitive action but also a socio-cultural engagement. In other words, spectatorship contains the universals across the various cultures and at the same time socio-cultural specifics. In the ending part of this paper, I extend my discourses about spectatorship to the ideological perspectives, dealing with the problem of capitalist spectacles and the emergence of multitude replacing mass which has been traditionally described as the consumer of cultural productions. According to cognitive narratologists, we process our experience in terms of our prerequisite narrative schemas that we acquire through our socio-cultural activities. In this sense, the spectator is a creator of her/his life stories through the imaginary situations and conditions presented via a performance. As cognitive scientists suggest, our faculty of empathy enables us to operate the process of simulation. By watching other peoples` lives on stage, we live through other peoples` lives and we can understand what other people think and feel. As a social being, we must not be ignorant to plights and pains of other people since our welling-being and happiness are dependent on other people in our community. As a practitioner of theatre, in the age of multitude, I ask myself, what stories can we share?

디지털 브레히트: 디지털 게임 공학과 브레히트적 연극의 만남 : 루딕 씨어터 ≪초현실씨의 유방≫ 공연 사례를 통해서

이강임 ( Lee Gang-im ) 한국연극교육학회 2021 연극교육연구 Vol.39 No.-

In this paper, I deal with the intermedial performance called the ludic theatre, whose term I coined in order to designate a specific digital performance for on-line spectators(audience). The ludic theatre features the characteristics of digital games and the Brechtian theatre, forming a hybrid version of the game theatre. From the beginning of the history of the theatre, technological developments have changed the shape of the theatre. Especially, in the historical time of digital turn, we, theatre people, are situated between welcoming and denial of digitalization of the theatre. As a conceiver and a director of the Bechtian digital game theatre, I argue that we do not face barriers against the developments of the theatre, but having a great opportunity to enrich the theatrical storytelling by means of learning from new digital media. I draw my attention to the growth of the digital game industry and game studies. Meanwhile, our global pandermic environments also let us consider the possibility of the on-line theatre. Upon these artistic and social circumstances, I have searched for a new form of theatre called ‘the ludic theatre.’ Also, in this paper, against more theoretical backgrounds, from the perspectives of performance studies, I illuminate how we, theatre people, can learn from the advanced immersive technology and make more appealing affects and effects in theatrical storytelling. Upon developing the intermedial genre, I investigated the ways in which the spectators could have more intimate and participatory experiences. For more engaged spectators, as a designer of the seed game model, < Cho Hyun Sil Game >, I learned from game studies and digital literacy. I wrestled with the game mechanics and the design fundamentals, having found the basic techniques and methods to weave a new kind of ludic storytelling. Through the sampling model of the ludic theatre, ≪The Bosoms of Choi Hyun Sil≫, which I conceived and directed for ‘2020 The Festival of Cultural Diversity,’ I examine how this kind of hybrid intermedial genre, as a metasimulation, empowers on-line spectators(audience), opening up a social space for discussing our social/cultural issues and conundrums regarding social discrimination and oppression

(인공) 정서 시대의 과학적 정서 이론과 연기 테크닉의 문제 -알바 이모팅 테크닉을 중심으로-

이강임 ( Lee Gang-im ) 한국드라마학회 2022 드라마연구 Vol.- No.68

본 논문은 (인공) 정서 시대에, 다양한 사회적 영역에서 수렴적 이슈가 되고 있는 정서와 연기 테크닉을 연구한다. 필자는 주디스 버틀러(Judith Butler)가 우리의 실제 삶과 지배적 ‘젠더’ 개념의 틈에서 발생하는 ‘젠더 문제(gender trouble)’를 심층적으로 다루었듯이, 연기 창조 과정과 연기 테크닉 개발에 있어서, 기존 정서 개념과 현상학적으로 우리가 마주하는 정서 ‘사이’에서 발생하는 ‘정서 문제(emotion trouble)’를 다룬다; ‘정서의 소환,’ ‘정서 재현,’ ‘정서 동일화,’ ‘연기자의 감정선,’ ‘정서적 몰입,’ ‘진정성 있는 연기,’ ‘진짜 정서.’ 과학적 정서 이론의 계보를 살펴보면, 정서 개념은 크게, 본질주의적 정서 개념과 구성주의적 정서 개념으로 나눌 수 있다. 전자에는 내용적 차이가 존재하지만, 폴 에크만(Paul Ekman)과 수잔나 블로흐(Susana Bloch) 등이 속하는데, ‘보편적 기본 정서,’ ‘내재적 신경 다발,’ ‘순수 정서’와 같은 본질주의적 아이디어를 옹호한다. 본질주의적 접근의 특징은 ‘줄무늬 무지개’로 표현되는 확실하고 명확한 구분과 경계로서의 정서 개념이다. 한편, 정서의 구성주의적 입장을 지지하는 리사 펠드먼 배럿(Lisa Feldman Barret)과 마크 브라켓(Marc Brackett) 같은 인지심리 학자들은, 정서를 ‘스펙트럼으로 나타나는 무지개’처럼, 경계가 모호한 다양한 차이로 정의한다. 필자는 정서 문제에 과학적으로 접근하기 위해, 본질주의적 정서 개념을 비판하며, ‘구성’으로서의 정서 개념을 도출하는 배럿의 ‘구성된 정서 이론’을 살펴본다. ‘구성된 정서 이론’에서, 정서는 우리 몸마음의 신경 네트워크에 의해 ‘구성’되며, 감각, 이미지, 사고, 언어 수행과 동시적으로 발생하는 과정이며, 우리 몸마음의 ‘행위’이다. 살아 숨 쉬는 연기자의 몸이, ‘제2의 몸,’ 즉 ‘가상의 몸’을 구성해서 가상 세계를 살아가는 연기 창조 과정에서, 정서는 언제든지 소환해서 불러낼 수 있고, 필요 없으면, 도로 갖다 놓을 수 있는 재현 가능한 그 어떤 것이 아니다. 뇌과학자이자 인지심리학자인 수잔나 블로흐는 본질주의적 정서 개념을 바탕으로, 연기자가 언제든지, 의지하는 대로, 정서를 유도하고, 관객에게 생생하게 전달할 수 있는, 비법 같은 알바 이모팅 테크닉(Alba Emoting Technique)을 제시한다. 필자는 드니 디드로(Denis Diderot)의 역설을 풀 황금 열쇠를 가질 수 있다고 약속하는 것처럼 들리는, 이 알바 이모팅 테크닉을 ‘구성된 정서 이론’의 전망에서 조명한다. 연기자의 가상의 몸에 숨을 불어 넣고 맥박을 뛰게 할 수 있을 만한 강력한 알바 메소드의 정서 효과기 패턴(Emotional Effector Pattern) 훈련은 그 매력만큼이나, 리스크 또한 적지 않다. 그러나, 무엇보다, 알바 이모팅 테크닉은 연기자가 상징적인 기호로서의 얼굴 표정이나, 제스처에 의존할 것이 아니라, 온전히 집중된 몸마음의 생리신체적 접근을 강조한다. 배럿의 구성된 정서 이론의 신경 메카니즘에서 바라보면, 테크닉의 체화는 신체적 근육의 움직임을 포함하는, 우리 세포와, 신경계, 내장을 변화시키는 재체화(reembodiment)이며, 우리 몸마음의 재구성(reconstruction)이다. 필자는 구성된 정서 이론의 입장에서, 알바 이모팅 테크닉의 본질주의적 태도를 비판하면서도, 알바 이모팅 테크닉의 생리신체적 접근의 장점을 활용할 수 있는 방안을 제시한다. 필자는 알바 이모팅 테크닉과 다른 체화 테크닉들, 즉 이미지 체화법, 신체적 행동법, 가상의 몸, 조형술, 뷰포인트 등의 다양한 테크닉들이, 어떠한 기초적 바탕과 원리에서 상호보완적으로 활용될 수 있는지 논의한다. In this paper, I deal with ‘emotion trouble,’ in a manner Judith Butler looks at the matter of gender. According to Burtler, we do not inherit gender, but we do perform our gender. Likewise, our emotions are not based on a bunch of neuronal bundles with which we react to our environment. Rather, our emotions are the active simulations of our bodymind from which we can predict our present and future against the harsh environment surrounding us. Truly, the matter of emotion is a converging issue throughout many disciplines and fields. We are witnessing the production of a human-like robot and an autonomous agent in terms of having a human-like artificial emotion. Even for the machines, compassion and empathy are the most valuable ethical grounds. As an acting teacher and a director, I face ‘emotion trouble,’ both in a class and in the theatre. What is an emotion? Or, in the way William James questions, where is an emotion? Why do we so care about our emotions? Why do the actors try hard to get right emotions during the course of storytelling? As a practitioner, how can I approach emotions being described as a spectrum of a rainbow? How can we control our emotions even though we do not know much about our emotions? In this paper, I examine ‘emotion trouble,’ especially, regarding an acting technique, focused on a specific acting technique called Alba Emoting Technique(AET) conceived by Susana Bloch. Against the theory of the constructed emotion, I look into the core system of ATE, Emotional Effector Patterns, which are constituted as triad of breathing, facial-expression, and posture. From the perspectives of the new emotion paradigm, I examine the promises and hopes of ATE to unlock the Diderot’s paradoxes, not to reject ATE, but to reconsider the matter of embodiment of emotions from the ground.

인지과학의 패러다임으로 살펴본 연기예술의 창조과정과 방법론 연구 : 체계적이고 과학적인 공연학의 정립을 위하여

이강임 ( Gang Im Lee ) 한국연극학회 2009 한국연극학 Vol.0 No.38

These days, we are witnessing an outstanding scientific revolution called `cognitive science.` Cognitive studies in the fields of neuroscience, psychology, linguistics, philosophy, and other disciplines have made a remarkable development in the past twenty years in understanding such cognitive areas as perception, memory, imagination, empathy, emotions, behavior, and meaning-making. In fact, cognitive science is replacing the dominant influences of Freudian psychoanalysis, behaviorism, and semiotics. Scholars in theatre and performance studies are beginning to apply these findings to their field. For the first time in South Korea, I explore the creative process of acting in terms of the new paradigm of cognitive science. In this paper, using the cognitive lens, I look into Stanislavsky`s `system` and Brecht`s `epic style acting` and reconsider the usefulness of the actor training system as one of the ways of establishing the systematic and scientific actor training program in South Korea. In this paper, I introduce the succinct outline of cognitive science in order to engage the readers who are not quitely familiar with it to my study of science of acting. I apply ideas from cognitive science to illuminate the process of acting through the works of such cognitive scientists as Antonio Damasio, Joseph LeDoux, Gerald Edelman, Steven Pinker, George Lakoff, and Mark Johnson. Methodologically, I adopt interdisciplinary approaches to render a more fruitful discussion about Stanislavsky`s system and Brecht`s epic style acting. In this paper, I argue that we should not ignore the findings and discoveries of Stanislavsky`s system and Brecht`s epic style acting due to its old scientific paradigm. On the contrary, I assert, they should be reconstructed from the perspectives and prospects of cognitive science. In the main body of the paper, first, adopting the discoveries and findings from cognitive science, I try to deconstruct the dichotomous division between art/science, body/mind, emotion/reason, consciousness/unconsciousness, inside/outside of the body. After I postulate the cognitive foundation for actor`s bodymind, then, I examine the important conceptual tools of Stanislavsky`s system and Brecht`s epic style acting: character, role, given circumstances, imagination, attention, empathy, projection, dual consciousness, gestus, etc. At the end, I investigate how these discrete acting methods can converge on the troubled issue of the actor`s exploration of creative processes in acting. While I explain these cognitive concepts, I suggest various practical training methods and procedures, which I have tried from the discoveries and findings of cognitive science. Ultimately, I hope that this paper opens up a space for a dialogue about the systematic and scientific actor training programs in South Korea.