Theatre as technology : apparatus, nostalgia, obsolescence / W. B. Worthen.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Worthen, William B., 1955- Author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Theater--Technological innovations.

Theater.

Theater--Philosophy.

Technology and the arts.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (viii, 218 pages) : digital, PDF file(s).

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Cambridge : Cambridge University Press, 2025.

Summary:

Theatre does not merely use technology - it is a technology. In this paradigm-shifting study, W. B. Worthen shows how the dynamics of obsolescence and affective nostalgia that shape the passing of technologies into history also shape and reshape theatrical practice. Locating theatre within rather than outside the orbit of media studies, Theatre as Technology traces the theatre's absorption of, and absorption by, digital culture. Treating subjects as wide-ranging as pandemic-era Zoom theatre, on-stage video and sound technologies, and artificial intelligence, Worthen locates a moment of transformational change in the idea of the theatre, change prompted by the theatre's always-changing, and so always obsolescing, material technologies.

Notes:

Title from publisher's bibliographic system (viewed on 28 Nov 2025).

ISBN:

1-009-64733-4

1-009-64731-8