Performing the 'new' Europe ― Identities, Feelings and Politics in the Eurovision Song Contest

Bringing together the voices of scholars from Europe and North America with those of key contest stakeholders, Performing the 'New' Europe: Identities, Feelings, and Politics in the Eurovision Song Contest argues that this popular music competition is a symbolic contact zone between European cultures: an arena for European identification in which both national solidarity and participation in a European identity are confirmed, and a site where cultural struggles over the meanings, frontiers and limits of Europe are enacted. This exciting collection explores the ways in which European artists perform, disavow, and contest their racial, national, and sexual identities in the Eurovision Song Contest (ESC), and asks difficult questions about European inclusions and exclusions the contest reflects. It suggests the ESC as an ever-evolving network of peoples and places transcending both historical and geographical boundaries of Europe that brings into being new understandings of the relationship between culture, space, and identities.

Karen Fricker is Assistant Professor in the Department of Dramatic Arts at Brock University, Canada. Her research interests include contemporary performance and globalization, performances of national identity, Quebecois and Irish theatres and theatre criticism. She is the author of Making Theatre Global: Robert Lepage's Original Stage Productions (2013)

Milija Gluhovic is Associate Professor of Theatre and Performance and Director of an Erasmus Mundus MA in International Performance Research at the University of Warwick, UK. His research interests include contemporary European theatre and performance, memory studies, and discourses of European identity, migrations and human rights. He is the author of Performing European Memories: Trauma, Ethics, Politics (2013).