A History of East African Theatre, Volume 1: Horn of Africa (Transnational Theatre Histories)

This book is the first ever transnational theatre study of an African region. Covering nine nations in two volumes, the project covers a hundred years of theatre making across Burundi, Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda, Somalia, Tanzania, and Uganda. This volume focuses on the theatre of the Horn of Africa. The book shows how the theatres of Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, and Somalia, little known in the outside world, have been among the continent's most politically important, commercially successful, and widely popular; making work almost exclusively in local languages and utilizing hybrid forms that have privileged local cultural modes of production. __A History of African Theatre__ is relevant to all who have interests in African cultures and their relationship to the history and politics of the East African region. Front Matter ....Pages i-xvi Introduction (Jane Plastow)....Pages 1-50 Chapter 1: Somali Theatre (Jane Plastow)....Pages 51-135 Chapter 2: Ethiopia and Eritrea: The Imperial Theatre—1921–1974 (Jane Plastow)....Pages 137-209 Chapter 3: Ethiopia and Eritrea: 1973–2016 (Jane Plastow)....Pages 211-297 Back Matter ....Pages 299-305 The final chapter, on Theatre for Development and related social action theatre, covers the whole East African region, offering the first ever historicised analysis of this mode of theatre making which, since the 1980s, has come to dominate funding and opportunity in performance arts.