Theatrocracy : Greek Drama, Cognition, and the Imperative for Theatre

Theatrocracy is a book about the power of the theatre, how it can affect the people who experience it, and the societies within which it is embedded. It takes as its model the earliest theatrical form we possess complete plays from, the classical Greek theatre of the fifth century BCE, and offers a new approach to understanding how ancient drama operated in performance and became such an influential social, cultural, and political force, inspiring and being influenced by revolutionary developments in political engagement and citizen discourse. Key performative elements of Greek theatre are analyzed from the perspective of the cognitive sciences as embodied, live, enacted events, with new approaches to narrative, space, masks, movement, music, words, emotions, and empathy. This groundbreaking study combines research from the fields of the affective sciences – the study of human emotions – including cognitive theory, neuroscience, psychology, artificial intelligence, psychiatry, and cognitive archaeology, with classical, theatre, and performance studies. This book revisits what Plato found so unsettling about drama – its ability to produce a theatrocracy , a "government" of spectators – and argues that this was not a negative but an essential element of Athenian theatre. It shows that Athenian drama provided a place of alterity where audiences were exposed to different viewpoints and radical perspectives. This perspective was, and is, vital in a freethinking democratic society where people are expected to vote on matters of state. In order to achieve this goal, the theatre offered a dissociative and absorbing experience that enhanced emotionality, deepened understanding, and promoted empathy. There was, and still is, an urgent imperative for theatre. Cover 1 Title 4 Copyright 5 Dedication 6 Contents 8 Acknowledgements 10 Introduction: theatre as a mimetic mind 12 Distributed cognition 17 Prediction 19 Emotions 20 Comparative social modeling 25 Empathy 29 The mimetic mind 33 1 Muthos: probability and prediction 41 Making sense of surprisal 42 Basic Bayes 50 Probabilistic politics 52 Extending prediction 55 2 Opsis: the embodied view 63 Environment and action 64 Phantasia theatre 65 The seeing place of Dionysos 69 Re-thinking open-air theatre 73 The four realms of theatrical three-dimensional space 78 Dionysos and dopamine 81 3 Ethos: the character of catharsis 90 Mask as theatrical frame 93 The affective mask 94 Projecting emotions 97 The mutable mask 101 Peripheral and foveal vision 107 Kuleshovian contexts 109 The mask in its cultural and cognitive context 111 Culture, literacy, and face processing 116 A cognitive change of masks 120 4 Dianoia: intention in action 131 Perception and action 132 The action-orientated spectator 136 Kinesthetic emotional contagion 138 Mitigating mirror neurons 139 Whole body perception 143 Sensorimotor gestures 145 Chorality and empathy 150 5 Melos: music and the mind 165 Cross-cultural music 166 The super-expressive aulos 168 The dissonant lament 173 A musical tragic paradox 176 Musical dissonance and absorption 178 Prediction and musical expectancy 180 6 Lexis: somatosensory words 191 The movement of meter 192 Masked language 196 Linguistic evaluative conditioning 199 A somatosensory analysis of Aeschylus 202 Understanding the unintelligible 206 7 Metabasis: dissociation and democracy 215 The Default Mode Network 215 En xena xenon – “a stranger in a strange land” 217 Dissociation – absorption – empathy 222 Ancient empathy in action 224 Coda: ancient empathy today 227 Index 234 This Book Examines Classical Greek Theatre, Asking How Ancient Drama Operated In Performance And Became Such An Influential Social, Cultural And Political Force. Meineck Approaches Greek Theatre From The Perspective Of The Cognitive Sciences As An Embodied Live Enacted Event, And Analyses How Different Performative Elements Acted Upon Audiences To Create Absorbing Narrative Action, Emotional Intensity, Intellectual Reflection And Empathy. This Was The Key To The Transformative Artistic And Social Power That Enabled Greek Drama To Advance Alternate Viewpoints. He Also Explores What The Model Of Greek Drama Can Reveal About Live Theatre's Value In Cultural, Social And Political Discourse Today.-- Peter Meineck. Includes Bibliographical References And Index. "This book examines classical Greek theatre, asking how ancient drama operated in performance and became such an influential social, cultural and political force. Meineck approaches Greek theatre from the perspective of the cognitive sciences as an embodied live enacted event, and analyses how different performative elements acted upon audiences to create absorbing narrative action, emotional intensity, intellectual reflection and empathy. This was the key to the transformative artistic and social power that enabled Greek drama to advance alternate viewpoints. He also explores what the model of Greek drama can reveal about live theatre's value in cultural, social and political discourse today."-- Provided by publisher