Babak Ebrahimian abstract

If war and its mechanisms can be understood as the conflict of desire, then the mimetic theory has much to offer in explanation of war and its different mechanisms, where at the start two individuals come together as rivals and later become doubles.

The state of doubles, a crisis between two individuals who are are more or less one and the same person, with one and the same in their desires, actions and behaviors, becomes the starting point. It is dangerous whereby if the violence between the doubles is not contained or resolved through the sacrificing of one over the other, the doubles can spread into society contaminating it with the same desire and violence. In the same way, that desire and violence has found its way into two individuals, it can easily spread from two individuals, the doubles, into an entire society, creating what is called the crisis of undifferentiation, where just as with the doubles, differences are erased and eradicated and society as a whole can no longer find differences within and between themselves. As with the crisis of doubles, the only way to emerge out of the crisis is through a sacrifice, hence another name for the crisis: sacrificial crisis or what we commonly call war. Drama and dramatic literaturefrom ancient times of Greek Drama to the Modern and Contemporary times illustrate this mechanism of war boldly and clearly.

Using this mimetic understanding of war and its mechanisms, the presentation will examine select dramatists and dramas from the canon of Western Drama to illuminate and show how different dramatists have reflected and portrayed war, from ancient Greeks to Contemporary times, and with different stories, perspectives, and takes.

Babak Ebrahimian received his Masters and Ph.D. degrees from Stanford University . He has taught at Stanford and Columbia Universities and has written two books on the theatre, The Cinematic Theater (Scarecrow Press, 2002) and Sculpting Space in the Theatre: Conversations with the tops set, lighting and costume designers (Focal Press, 2006), and written numerous articles on theatre, cinema and popular culture in established journals such as Theater Journal, Performance Art Journal, Communications and Feminist Media Studies. In addition, he has directed classical and contemporary pieces for the theatre. [Note: The European edition of the design book is called Theatre Design: Behind the scene with the top set, lighting and costume designers (RotoVision, 2006)]

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