My research specialism is in contemporary British theatre since 1990 and, increasingly, contemporary European theatre and performance. I am particularly interested in how playwrights and theatre-makers engage with salient political and philosophical questions pertinent to our socio-historical conjuncture. Much of my research therefore has focused on politically-motivated theatres, but I am also keen to find the political elsewhere in theatre-making. Formally, I am particularly interested in new writing, delegated performance, and socially-engaged theatre practice.

My recent publications and conference presentations have explored the ways in which theatre articulates and anticipates forms of resistance to – or indeed compliance with – hegemonic ideology. I have undertaken research on queer identities, collective agency, dissident understandings of time, and the dramaturgical uses of consensus and consent in contemporary British theatre, and devising methods. The plays of Sarah Kane, Ed Thomas, Tim Crouch, Andy Smith, and Chris Thorpe; the practice of theatre companies Quarantine and Rimini Protokoll, and the directing methods of Roger Bernat are among my case studies.

Following the publication of my first monograph Rethinking Character in Contemporary British Theatre: Aesthetics, Politics, Subjectivity (2015), my current research focuses on two areas. I am preparing my projected second book, on British theatre-maker Tim Crouch for Manchester University Press, while also contributing to an international research project entitled "British Theatre in the Twenty-First Century: Crisis, Affect, Community". Led by Prof Mireia Aragay at Universitat de Barcelona, this research project is funded by the Spanish Ministerio of Economía y Competitividad and by European Regional Development Fund between Jan 2017 and Dec 2020. The first output of this project is the collection titled Affects in 21st-Century British Theatre: Exploring Feeling on Page and Stage, which I am co-editing with Dr Mireia Aragay and Prof Martin Middeke for Palgrave.

List by: Type | Date

• 2017-2020: "British theatre in the twenty-first century: crisis, affect, community". Funding bodies: Spanish Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad; European Regional Development Fund. Role: Co-investigator. Principal Investigator: Prof Mireia Aragay (Barcelona). Funds: €50,000.
• 2013-2016: "Ethical issues in contemporary British theatre since 1989: globalisation, theatricality, spectatorship". Funding bodies: Spanish Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad; Catalan Agency for Management of University and Research Grants. Role: Co-investigator. Principal Investigator: Prof Mireia Aragay (Barcelona). Funds: €75,200 
• 2014: “Representations of precariousness in contemporary British theatre”. Funding body: German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD). Role: Co-investigator. Principal Investigator: Prof Martin Middeke (Augsburg). Funds: €6,690.
• 2009-2012: PhD Studentship. Funding body: Department of Theatre, Film and Television Studies, Aberystwyth University.

I very welcome enquiries from potential PhD students interested in my areas of research:

• Contemporary British theatre: new writing, delegated performance, socially-engaged theatre practice
• Political theatre and socially-engaged theatre practice
• Theatre and philosophy
• Contemporary European theatre and performance, particularly in the Spanish/Catalan context.

Current doctoral students:

• Luz Cáceres Paton, University of Glasgow, 'Verbatim theatre: Advancing testimonial justice and inclusive deliberation in Mexico, Guatemala and El Salvador' (2019-present).
• Andrew Lennon, University of Birmingham, 'An Uncanny Aesthetic: Investigating cross-disciplinary performative reality in contemporary theatre' (co-supervisor at University of Birmingham, 2016-18; external co-supervisor, 2018-20).

• Caceres Paton, Luz
  'Verbatim theatre: Advancing testimonial justice and inclusive deliberation in Mexico, Guatemala and El Salvador'

I am a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy and hold a Postgraduate Certificate in Academic Practice (University of Birmingham, 2017). 

In the academic year 2019-20, I will teach, contribute to teaching and/or convene the following courses:

MLitt courses

• Debating Dramaturgy 2 (convenor)
• Independent Research Project (Dramaturgy) (convenor)
• Playwriting 2 (covenor, course delivered by Lynda Radley)

Undergraduate courses

• Theatre Studies Dissertation (Level 4, senior hons)
• Modernism to Postdramatic (Level 2)

I also convene the MLitt Theatre Studies and MLitt Playwriting and Dramaturgy programmes (2019-20, sem. 2).

In previous years at Glasgow, I have taught/contributed to teaching and convened the following courses:

MLitt courses

• Debating Dramaturgy 2 (convenor)
• Reading and Interpreting Performance (convenor)

Undergraduate courses

• Theatre Studies Dissertation (Level 4, senior hons)
• Performance Theory and Analysis (Level 4, junior hons; convenor)
• Modernism to Postdramatic (Level 2)
• Classical to Modern (Level 2)
• Theatre and Society (Level 1)
• Reading the Stage (Level 1)

At Glasgow, I hold a number of roles at subject and School level:

• Convenor of MLitt Theatre Studies and MLitt Playwriting and Dramaturgy programmes (2019-20, sem. 2).
• Theatre Studies PGT convenor (2019-20, sem. 2).
• Theatre Studies research seminars convenor (2018-20).
• Theatre Studies Ethics Officer (2018-20).
• Theatre Studies representative in the School's Learning and Teaching Committee (2019-20, sem. 2).
• Theatre Studies representative in the School's PG Committee (2019-20, sem. 2).

Elsewhere:

• Co-convenor of the Political Performances Working Group of the International Federation for Theatre Research (2018-21). 
• Reviews Editor of the journal Performing Ethos (2018 - present).
• External Examiner for the MA Theatre at the University of Lincoln (2019-present).

Conference co-organisation & facilitation

• With Trish Read and Julia Boll, convenorship and curation of Political Performances Working Group sessions for 2020 IFTR congress. Theatre Ecologies: Environments, Sustainability, and Politics. Galway. July 2020.
• With Trish Read and Julia Boll, convenorship and curation of Political Performances Working Group sessions for 2019 IFTR congress. Theatre, Performance and Urbanism. Shanghai Theatre Academy. July 2019.
• With Lucy Ellinson, Aneta Mancewicz and Chris Thorpe, facilitator of two workshops on theatre and democracy. Radical Mischief: A Conference Inviting Experiment in Theatre, Thought and Politics. The Other Place, RSC. Stratford-Upon-Avon. July 2018.
• With Trish Read and Julia Boll, convenorship and curation of Political Performances Working Group sessions, and lead convenor for 2018 IFTR congress. Theatre and Migration. University of Belgrade. July 2018.
• With Caroline Radcliffe and Paul Geary. Standing Conference of University Drama Departments (SCUDD). University of Birmingham. June 2018.
• With Mireia Aragay and Enric Monforte. 24th annual conference of the German Society for Contemporary Theatre and Drama in English (CDE). Theatre and Spectatorship. University of Barcelona. June 2015.

Keynotes and invited research seminars

• 'Labours Lost: Delegated Performance and the Work of Erasure', invited research seminars. University of Lincoln, December 2017; University of Reading, November 2017.
• 'The Work of Others: Delegated Performance, the Workers and Their Double'. Keynote presentation. Theatre, Performance & Employment symposium. Queen Mary, University of London. February 2017.

Recent conference presentations

• With Andy Smith. ‘Politics and Poetics: Dealing with Representation in Contemporary Theatre'. What Happens Now: 21st Century Writing in English. University of Lincoln. June 2016.
• 'Spectacular Ambivalence: Tim Crouch’s The Author in its Theatrical and Political Context'. IFTR. University of Stockholm. June 2016.
• '"For Something Worthwhile to Happen It’s Simply Not Enough to Wish the Situation Otherwise": Pessimism, Meta-Theatricality and Spectatorship in Tim Crouch and Andy Smith’s what happens to the hope at the end of the evening and Chris Thorpe’s There Has Possibly Been an Incident'. What Happens Now: 21st Century Writing in English. University of Lincoln. July 2014.
• 'Conceptual Art, Theatre, and ‘the Return of the Repressed’: Rethinking Tim Crouch’s Dramaturgy and Its Politics’. IFTR. Institut del Teatre, Barcelona. July 2013.
• 'Making Time, Undoing Habitus: Equality and Emancipation in Quarantine’s Entitled'. CDE. Theatre and Politics: Theatre as Cultural Intervention. Prague. May–June 2013.
• '"Look at Us. All This Is Art”: Capitalism, Aesthetics and the Invisible Politics of Consent in Tim Crouch’s ENGLAND'. The Viewing of Politics and the Politics of Viewing: Theatre Challenges in the Age of Globalised Communities. Aristotle University, Thessaloniki. April 2013.

Conversations and public engagement

• Speaker at Different Stages research showcase event, part of 'Different Stages: Exploring public engagement for Drama and Theatre early career academics', a British Academy-funded project run by Dr Naomi Paxton. Glasgow Women’s Library, January 2020.
• With Lyn Gardner, filmed conversation on contemporary British theatre, representation and participation for Digital Theatre+. Stratford-Upon-Avon, July 2018.