Circus as Multimodal Discourse

Performance, Meaning, and Ritual

By: Paul Bouissac

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Hardcover | 1 November 2012 | Edition Number 1

At a Glance

Hardcover
288 Pages

Dimensions(cm)
23.4 x 15.6 x 1.6

Hardcover

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Now available in paperback, this volume presents a theory of the circus as a secular ritual and introduces a method to analyze its performances as multimodal discourse.

The book's fifteen chapters cover the range of circus specialties (magic, domestic and wild animal training, acrobatics, and clowning) and provide examples to show how cultural meaning is produced, extended and amplified by circus performances. Bouissac is one of the world's leading authorities on circus ethnography and semiotics and this work is grounded on research conducted over a 50 year span in Europe, Asia, Australia and the Americas.

It concludes with a reflection on the potentially subversive power of this discourse and its contemporary use by activists. Throughout, it endeavours to develop an analytical approach that is mindful of the epistemological traps of both positivism and postmodernist license. It brings semiotics and ethnography to bear on the realm of the circus.

Industry Reviews

"Bouissac's decades-long circus career combines with his semiotic expertise, producing an elucidating guide to the precedents and developments of various circus acts and their hitherto unspoken modes of communication. ... Bouissac's work it is encouraging to find literature that takes an analytical approach to current performance work." - Katharine Kavanagh, Theatre Research International

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