Rehearsal Practices of Indigenous Women Theatre Makers

Book excerpt: This transnational and transcultural study intimately investigates the theatre making practices of Indigenous women playwrights from Australia, Aotearoa, and Turtle Island. It offers a new perspective in Performance Studies employing an Indigenous standpoint, specifically an Indigenous woman's standpoint to privilege the practices and knowledges of Maori, First Nations, and Aboriginal women playwrights. Written in the style of ethnographic narrative the author affords the reader a ringside seat in providing personal insights on the process of negotiating access to rehearsals in each specific cultural context, detailed descriptions of each rehearsal location, and describing the visceral experiences of observing Indigenous theatre makers from inside the rehearsal room. The Indigenous scholar and theatre maker draws on Rehearsal Studies as an approach to documenting the day-to-day working practices of Indigenous theatre makers and considers an Indigenous Standpoint as a valid framework for investigating contemporary Indigenous theatre practices in a colonised context. Dr Liza-Mare Syron has family ties to the Biripi people from NSW Australia. She is a director, actor, teacher, dramaturge and an award winning academic. Liza-Mare is a co-founder of Moogahlin Performing Arts, and is currently a Senior Associate of the company, and a Senior Scientia Lecturer at UNSW, Sydney.