Goldingay Auslander Plagiarising Theory Performance and Religion

8/12/2019 Goldingay Auslander Plagiarising Theory Performance and Religion

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Studies in Theatre and Performance Volume 29 Number 1 2009 Intellect LtdArticle. English language. doi: 10.1386/stap.29.1.5/1

Plagiarising theory: performanceand religion?*Sarah Goldingay

AbstractCan a book that describes itself as Theory for Religious Studies simply slip off itscover and put on a new one saying Theory for Performance Studies, and stillwork? Can one critical theory framework fit all humanities disciplines? Accordingto Richard Schechner, Philip Auslander seems to think so. He has accused him of plagiarising a book written for Religious Studies and transferring it, wholesale,

onto Performance Studies. This article will examine the two books by focusing,not on what Auslander retains of the original Religious Studies text, but by con-sidering the editorial interventions he makes. It will examine how, by removingChristianity whilst retaining Buddhism, in the entry for Slavoj iek, Auslan-ders editorial process can be seen, perhaps, to be both symptomatic and illustra-tive of Performance Studies relationship to religious practices that are perceived to be traditionally Western, and predominantly Christian.

In August of 2008, an article began circulating entitled Plagiarism, Greedand the Dumbing Down of Performance Studies (Schechner 2008). Its

content was shocking, because in it Richard Schechner apparentlyaccuses Philip Auslander, in his bookTheory for Performance Studies: AStudents Guide(2008), of plagiarising 90 per cent of another book,William E. Deal and Timothy K. BealsTheory for Religious Studies(2004).The article states:

The theorists discussed in the two books are identical; the order in whichthey are presented is identical; the wording in the two books is almostentirely identical; the overall length of the two books is identical (168 pages).There is one significant difference: the Deal and Beal book is copyright 2004by Taylor & Francis Books, Inc. (Routledges parent company) whileAuslanders book is copyright 2008 Philip Auslander.

The articles format simply a PDF file embedded in a web site entitledinterregnum.dk did little to verify its authenticity and move its status, inmy mind, beyond the category of unlikely hoax. However, on further inves-tigation by examining the texts side by side and then speaking to a col-league, who had spoken to Talia Rodgers, the books editor at Routledge,as well as Richard Schechner himself the article proved to be authentic.

The book produced by Auslander is, for the most part, an exact reproduc-tion of the Deal and Beal original. Routledge have, in a variety of statements,

Keywordsperformance studiesreligious studiesSlavoj iekChristianityPhilip AuslanderPlagiarism

* Since the completioof this article,Routledge hasannounced, withPhilip Auslandersagreement, itsdecision to pulp allthe remaining copieofTheory for Performance Studies.


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made it clear that this book, as one of a series based on the Deal and Bealtext, should have credited them as authors and did not because of humanerror. They have apologised in full, crediting Deal and Beal retrospectively.The consequences and ramifications of this case are about to be discussedin print in a forthcoming edition ofThe Drama Review, following a publicdiscussion at the 14th Psi conference in Copenhagen on 22 August 2008.

Schechners on-line article, which first brought this matter to myattention, focuses almost entirely on a discussion of plagiarism and theroles and responsibilities of publishers, authors and academic disciplinesin such a case. It highlights issues that are more complex than the simplefact that Deal and Beal have not been credited. It, quite rightly, raises ques-tions about intellectual property and copyright. However, that is not thefocus of this article. Here, I will focus not on what Auslander keeps of theDeal and Beal text, but on the changes that he makes to it. These changesare apparently insignificant, but in a text where so little is amended, anychanges that are made carry an important indication of the authorsintention and are worthy of detailed consideration. Before going on toexamine the details of these changes, I will first consider the books place,and relationship to the other texts, in theTheory 4series, which Deal andBeals book began and Auslanders ended. In particular, I will discuss howAuslanders decision to retain Deal and Beals list of thinkers in its entirety something the other authors in the series choose not to do highlightsand problematises the interplay of critical narratives from both ReligiousStudies and Performance Studies. I will conclude with a discussion of howsome of Auslanders editorial decisions are, perhaps, symptomatic and

illustrative of Performance Studies relationship with religion in generaland Christianity in particular.This case has impinged upon a central aspect of my research which is

concerned with how contemporary British spirituality is constructed andreconstructed by performance. Auslander, by transferring a significantamount of a book written for Religious Studies into a book for PerformanceStudies, challenges my own research position in two ways. First, throughthis process, he implicitly suggests that a single theoretical lens, constructedof a list of twenty-nine canonical modern and postmodern thinkers(Auslander 2008: 1), can be transferred wholesale across disciplines thatone analytical frame fits all. My research position, however, is different. Itargues that by using a unique framework, which is primarily grounded inPerformance Studies scholarship, something new about contemporary spiri-tuality can be revealed. I will discuss this in more detail later.

Auslanders second challenge lies in his implication that Christianity isnot a worthwhile topic of discussion for Performance Studies. When car-rying forward Deal and Beals entry for Slavoj iek, Auslander removes alreference to Christianity in his chapter by making small editorial interven-tions: in doing so, he denies iek this recurring, and critical, aspect of his

scholarship. I will address the details of this process in Section 3 later.Through this editorial process, he also suggests that Performance Studies


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has no theoretical interest in Christianity. I will argue, however, thatChristianity is a potent ideological force which is significant to the waypost-secular Westerners construct and perform their spiritual identities albeit a force that is naturalised, to the extent that it appears to be benign,and unworthy of discussion for many scholars. The article will concludewith a final section in which I consider what the removal of Christianity

from Auslanders book has to say about Performance Studies relationshipwith religion.

The Theory 4 seriesPublished in 2004, Deal and Beals book for Religious Studies became thefirst of a Routledge series calledTheory 4. It was followed by books on theoryfor art history (Dimitriadis and Kamberelis 2006), education (Emerling2005), classics (Hitchcock 2008) and finally, by AuslandersTheory for Per- formance Studies: A Students Guidein 2008. The books use a series format,established by the publisher, based on the first book: a short general intro-duction, then a series of entries on critical twentieth-century thinkers whoare categorised into two parts. Part one is entitledPredecessors, and dealswith thinkers who, broadly speaking, were working in the late nineteenthand early twentieth centuries, and, part two entitledTheorists, which dealswith thinkers from the mid-twentieth century. The entry for each individ-ual thinker opens with a list of their key concepts, followed by a brief biog-raphy, an exposition of their important ideas, and an explanation of howthese ideas are pertinent to the discipline the book is aimed at. Eachchapter then concludes with a bibliography and some suggested further

reading (and here, at least, Auslander provides some discipline-specific ref-erences).This structure forms the core for each book in the series, and all the

authors follow it. However, only Auslander chooses to follow exactly thelist of thinkers first suggested by Deal and Beal, whereas the other writersin the series make amendments to it. Auslander is, therefore, implying thata theoretical framework of key thinkers constructed for Religious Studiescan successfully, and unproblematically, be transferred to become a criticaltheory framework for Performance Studies. In fact, such a direct transfer isproblematic. Of course, there is interdisciplinary overlap, but Auslandersdirect transfer goes further than that. His wholesale transfer ontoPerformance Studies of an analytical framework which was constructedfor Religious Studies obliterates any sense of disciplinary difference. Hisbook does little more that change its cover.

The canonIn their introduction Deal and Beal acknowledge that [t]he academic studyof religion has no GUT, that is, no Grand Unifying Theory that brings intosharp focus all things religious. Moreover, they assert that [e]very theory

frames and focuses our attention on some things whilst leaving otherthings outside the frame or out of focus (Deal and Beal 2004: 1). However,


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Auslander disregards the modest position adopted by his colleagues, and intohis handbook tothekey connections between Performance Studies and crit-ical theories (Back cover; my emphasis), he introduces his own GUT.

He describes the list of theorists in his handbook tothekey connectionsbetween Performance Studies and critical theories which is identical tothat of Deal and Beal as a canon: a list of twenty-nine canonical modern

and postmodern thinkers. But this is a canon that does not surveyexclusively those theorists assumed to be central to Performance Studies(many are absent, in fact). This canon is constructed of figures whoseimportance is generally accepted in academic circles and [whose] influ-ence is not confined to Performance Studies or any other single discipline.Oddly, Auslander further explains that it is not a guide to key concepts of the field, and yet, the book claims, implicitly through its title, and explic-itly through its own marketing description on the back cover, to be author-itative. Thus, within one paragraph of his brief introduction, Auslander justifies how he can reduce a rich and complex, inclusive and challengingtheoretical network into a canon that is transferable across disciplines,because, with all its absences it can now be generally accepted in acade-mic circles. Performance Studies is a discipline that, at its very heart, con-tains a process of reflexivity; it questions and challenges ideologicalstructures, particularly within the academy: it is not about finding a wayof being generally accepted.

This position is compounded when we consider the books intendedaudience. It describes itself as an essential first volume and an introduc-tory text that is primarily aimed at undergraduates (Auslander 2008: 2).

However, this introductory text assumes a significant existent knowledgein its reader; it expects them to be able to fill in the absent theories andtheorists in a meaningful way. This requires a nuanced understanding of the interrelationship of Auslanders canon to the Performance Studiesscholars and practitioners whom he has not included: those, to be specific,whose work is grounded in anthropology, intercultural theory and linguis-tics, and who are critical to an understanding of the complexity of a disci-pline that is plural and inclusive in its interdisciplinary approach. Heassumes that there is a sufficient depth of knowledge in the reader toengage with that which is both present and absent. It is an unreasonableassumption.

These absences are most significant in light of the texts claims toauthority. For example, there are no anthropologists included in Auslanderscanon, which seems particularly strange when we consider how tradition-ally important both anthropology and ethnography are for PerformanceStudies in terms of its research methodologies and approaches and itsphilosophical positions which, in a postcolonial context, help scholars tolook beyond themselves in order to better understand the continuingpower and influence of a wider Western culture at the digital turn of an

intercultural world. To conclude this section, before moving on to examineAuslanders editorial treatment of Slavoj iek, I will suggest without


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claiming to know the authors mind, some possible interpretations of Auslanders canonical decisions.

Deal and Beal, in their introduction (2004: 1), justify their omissions of the anthropologists Geertz and Turner by stating;

[a]lthough there are excellent introductions to traditional theories of religion

(covering, among others, [. . .] Eliade, Turner and Geertz), there has not been acorresponding introduction to the newer theoretical perspectives treated here.

But what of Auslander? What does he do to justify his omissions, not onlyof Geertz and Turner, but also of other key scholars who have establishedthe disciplines theoretical core? In the opening to his book, he mentionsthat other introductions to performance and Performance Studies areavailable; however, unlike Deal and Beal, he does not acknowledge thelimitations of a canon, that is, broadly speaking male, made up of theFrankfurt School, Western and post-structuralist. Perhaps, then Auslanderis silently choosing, in his appropriation of Deal and Beals list of scholarsand his omission of anthropology, not to focus so strongly on theSchechnerian, New York University brand of Performance Studies whosegenealogy lies, amongst others, in Western and Indian philosophy, anthro-pology and feminism (see Schechner 2002: 7). Instead, perhaps, he ischoosing to focus on another driving force in Performance Studies, theNorthwestern focus on speech, communication and rhetoric in his inter-pretation of its theoretical genealogy (see Schechner 2002: 17). However,even the philosopher of linguistics J. L. Austin, who wrote the classic text

that is critical in the development of an understanding of performativity,How to do Things with Words(1962), also fails to make an appearance onthe list. There must be another intention at work.

Performance Studies is a unique discipline in many ways; its practice-based, ethically aware methodological approach, grounded in anthropo-logical foundations, is one of its strengths. There can be no definitive listof thinkers for the theory of Performance Studies, but a text that claimsthis level of authority should acknowledge the significance of anthropol-ogy in its theoretical make-up. Moreover, this particular canon sustainsa hierarchy of knowledges that Performance Studies, led by DwightConquergood, has fought to change; the valorisation of the cognitiveabove the embodied.

Interestingly, other authors in the series do include anthropologists.For example, Greg Dimitriadis and George Kamberelis, inTheory for Educa-tion(2006), include Clifford Geertz. They state that his landmark thinkingon culture and fieldwork was critical to much of the interpretive workthat would take hold in education in the 1980s (Dimitriadis andKamberelis 2006: 128). One might reasonably argue that Geertzs is acritical influence on Performance Studies, too. Dimitriadis and Kamberelis

also include Stuart Hall, whose early work with Paddy Whannel,ThePopular Arts(1964), explores the complexity and plural manifestations of


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popular culture, and continues to be significant not only for education butalso for Performance Studies.

For the other authors in this series this primary list is not a canon, andit is not directly transferable from Religious Studies to education or classicsor art history: it is Deal and Beals original format, adopted by the serieseditor, which serves their audience, not the absolute of the content devised

by Deal and Beal. Auslander, by choosing not to carry forward changesmade by other authors in the series, underlines his position, that for him,this canon is truly interdisciplinary and authoritative that one analyticalframe fits all. In so doing he reduces Performance Studies to a generalisa-tion; it becomes one of those humanities which occasionally dabble in thesocial sciences.

Cutting out ChristianityHaving looked at the wider implications of the books structure, I am nowgoing to consider the details of Auslanders small interventions into Deal andBeals entry for Slavoj iek. Auslander explains that iek [a]side from a fepages on Bertolt Brecht [. . .] has written very little on theatre or perfor-mance (Auslander 2008: 167). It is unlikely, therefore, that in a generalsweep of Performance Studies theory, a student will come across a more in-depth study of his work. This means that this entry, in this essential firsttext, should be, in its broad scope, an accurate reflection of the theoristswork. Auslander, however, makes the editorial choice of cutting the primarytheme of Christianity from ieks entry; a critical and recurring topic in his

work for more than a decade. This is done by a process of relatively smallinterventions, where words, rather than sentences, are changed. Thesechanges are apparently insignificant, but in a text where so little is amendedany changes that are made carry an important indication of the authorsintention and are worthy of detailed consideration. I am going to focus ontwo interventions that, in combination, enable Auslander to removeChristianity from ieks entry. Then, in conclusion, I will consider howAuslanders action is, perhaps, symptomatic and illustrative of PerformanceStudies relationship to Christianity in particular and religion at large.

Each entry, for each thinker on the list, begins with key words thatdescribe the thinkers big ideas. The key words that Deal and Beal use todescribe Slavoj iek are; authentic act, Buddhism, andagap and PaulineChristianity (Deal and Beal 2004: 165). For Auslander, these key wordsbecome authentic act, Buddhism and over-identification (Auslander 2008:165). To understand what this removal of Christianity means to a descrip-tion of ieks works, it is helpful first to explore what he means by the firsidea on the list, authentic act. Authentic act is a key tenet for iek. Forhim, it is a process that enables members of society to expose the mecha-nisms that facilitate the workings of late capitalism, what he terms its

symbolic order. He explains that, rather than attempting to achieve theimpossible and stand outside the totality of this symbolic order, it is instead


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better to engage in an authentic act that, by the performance of anauthentic act, the symbolic orders process can be exposed and its powerundermined. He suggests that at its heart Christianity has, in one of itstheological discourses, such an authentic act;agap . For iek, Saint Paul,in his construction of the Christian messianic narrative, creates at its centrethis authentic act ofagap , the act of unconditional love. iek argues that

the ideal ofagap can, by ignoring the circumventing the actions of capital-ist exchange by giving but expecting nothing in return undermine theprimary forces of financial exchange at work in late capitalism.

Auslander has changed the key concepts that introduce his entry foriek and, therefore, makes further editorial interventions to the chaptersmain body to ensure that Christianity does not appear. For example,whereas Deal and Beal explain that,

iek finds this radical potential this opening toward the authentic act thatcan break the hypnotic force of the symbolic not only in PaulineChristianity but also in early Buddhism.

(Deal and Beal 2004: 167)

in Auslanders rewrite this becomes,

iek finds one example of this radical potential this opening toward theauthentic act that can break the hypnotic force of the symbolic in earlyBuddhism.

(Auslander 2008: 166)

And thus, with the removal of not only in Pauline Christianity but also,and the addition of two words, oneexample (my emphasis), Christianity, andits radical, subversive potential is removed. Where then, does this eradica-tion leave the reader?

ieks basic position is Marxist. He himself is not Christian, but heargues for the importance of the Christian tradition, and that Marxismand Christianity are inextricably linked. In his key works,The TicklishSubject(1999), The Fragile Absolute or Why is the Christian legacy worth fight-ing for?(2000), On Belief(2001), The Puppet and the Dwarf: the Perverse Coreof Christianity(2003), he explicitly interrogates the ideological function of religion, and in particular the naturalised position held by Christianity.This is expressed clearly in the opening ofThe Fragile Absolutewhere iekexplains, thereis a direct lineage from Christianity to Marxism; yes,Christianity and Marxismshouldfight on the same side of the barricadeagainst the onslaught of new spiritualisms (p. 2, original emphasis).

It is interesting that I find myself championing iek, because in manyways I believe his partnering of the metanarratives of Christianity andMarxism in a binary opposition to the onslaught of new spiritualisms to

be a limiting position. iek, quite rightly, highlights the observable factthat the way religion in society is enacted is changing. The ongoing process


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of secularisation is affecting the way individuals performatively createtheir spiritual identities, which he describes as new spiritualisms, thosereligious practices that are outside what he deems to be Christianity.But this is more complex than identifying established Christian traditionsas authentic, and other practices as the onslaught of inauthentic spiritu-alisms. Decreasing church attendance and focus on long-established reli-

gious practice has not led to a rationalist secularisation, as suggested byDurkheim and Weber, but a tendency towards seeking behaviour, towardsa more individual, more eclectic approach to the construction of spiritualidentity. In this environment notions of authenticity have become animportant part of vindicating the construction of our spiritual practice.1iek, by placing Christianity the old, the established and the authentic in opposition to the new spiritualisms is able to claim a strong connectionto the rationalist past. Thus, iek presents Christianity as the primaryreligious residue in contemporary society, suggesting, therefore, that, ratherthan being removed from the discussion, as Auslander does, it should beactively interrogated. By choosing to remove Christianity from his repre-sentation of ieks work Auslander is castrating him as a thinker.

Conclusions: religion and performance studiesIn considering the implications of Auslanders editorial choices much of myresponse will be speculative. I am interested in why Auslander chooses toretain Buddhism but remove Christianity. And, without claiming to knowthe authors mind, or simply dismissing this process as the by-product of anact of plagiarism, I suggest that Auslanders editorial decisions are both

symptomatic and illustrative of the way that Performance Studies conceivesof and describe itself and, as such, are useful catalysts to stimulate a discus-sion that explores why Buddhism was retained whilst Christianity was cut.

Performance Studies, as a discipline that is focused on intercultural prac-tices, has been fascinated by the rich interrelationship of the sacred, the reli-gious and performance in other cultures. And so, religion has become animportant area of investigation connecting a variety of scholars working in avariety of ways. To discuss a performers spiritual practice, or how a processoriginally developed as an act of Hindu worship might be reapplied as aWestern performer-training method, or how Buddhist meditative practicemight be a useful metaphor to describe an actors process, has become com-monplace. However, Western traditions, particularly Christianity, are largelyignored. And so, in his editing of the Deal and Beal entry for iek, it isunderstandable that Auslander should remove Christianity but retainBuddhism. This is after all a book for the theory of Performance Studies.

But why is Christianity largely ignored in Performance Studies? My fullresponse is too complicated to discuss here in detail, but I have somebroadly based suggestions that outline the scope of three simultaneousand inter-related suggestions. The first identifies the historical relationship

of English Studies (which is a key antecedent of Performance Studies)with Christianity. English Studies grew, in part out of a sense of failure of

1. For intelligent andinteresting enquiriesinto new religiouspractices, movements,seeking behaviourand authenticity seeGordon Lynch(2007), The NewSpiritualityand GraceDavie, Paul Heelasand Linda Woodhead(eds.),PredictingReligion: Christian,Secular and AlternativeFutures,Aldershot:Ashgate.


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religion, specifically Christianity. As Terry Eagleton (1983[2008]: 20)states, [i]f one were asked to provide a single explanation for the growth of English Studies in the later nineteenth century, one could do worse thanreply: the failure of religion. The second recognises that PerformanceStudies emerged as both a development from, and a critique of, text-basedstudies, and continued the process of estrangement fromlogos-based

Christianity which was begun by English Studies. The third and final posi-tion notes that key practitioners in the development of Performance Studies(for example Artaud and Grotowski) looked to the East for their inspirationand therefore increased the marginalisation of Christianity. With the focusof these suggestions, and seen through the lens of Performance Studies, itseems as if Christianity has become a residual culture.

Christianity has become naturalised in Performance Studies, putbeyond discussion, and therefore beyond question, or worse, a topic that isexamined by practising and therefore subjective zealots who are unable todisentangle their misplaced belief from their research. This has had spe-cific effects on me as a researcher. As a non-Christian, the question I amasked most often by colleagues in the discipline is do you go to Churchthen?. I would suggest that scholars of queer theory would not be so fre-quently asked about their sexuality, and that if they were gay unlike theChristian scholar of religion this would be seen as a likely benefit totheir understanding their area of research.

This disengagement with Christianity is problematic. In the UnitedKingdom, we live in a society that is Christian by enculturation, rather thanby practice, and yet to dismiss its ongoing potency in contemporary society

is a mistake. Beyond the discipline there is a perception that to be C of E isto hold ones faith lightly, or as Kate Fox (2004: 355) puts it, to invoke aconvenient shorthand when filling out forms. However, that doesnt meanthat Christianity is impotent. Our former Prime Minister, was explicitlyChristian, as is our current one. Around one in four state primary schoolsand one in twenty state secondary schools are Church of England schools,which equates to over one million pupils, and 28 bishops sit in the House of Lords. Christianity still has a great deal of social (and political) influence.

I am not suggesting that Christianity in public life is a bad thing whatI am suggesting is that it is too readily overlooked. It is still an active forcein our ideological construction and still affects implicitly and explicitly theway our society views and constructs itself and, therefore, the way oursociety works. What Auslander does by removing Christianity from thedebate, aligning himself with the tendency to dismiss it, to naturalise it,is to place it beyond question, to exclude it from discussion. This isthe antithesis of what the project of Performance Studies is about.Performance Studies sets out to look at something in a new way, to revealand challenge previously unquestioned assumptions. A student who readsAuslanders book, and does no further reading, will not have the sugges-

tion raised to them that Christianity is a force at work in our contempo-rary culture, and it will continue to be unchallenged.


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Works CitedAuslander, Philip (2008),Theory for Performance Studies: A Students Guide, London

and New York: Routledge.Austin, John L. (1962),How to do Things with Words, Oxford: Clarendon Press.Deal, William E. and Timothy K. Beal (2004),Theory for Religious Studies, London

and New York: Routledge.Dimitriadis, Greg and George Kamberelis (2006),Theory for Education, London and

New York: Routledge.Eagleton, Terry (1983 [2008]),Literary Theory: An Introduction, Minneapolis:

University of Minnesota Press.Emerling, Jae (2005),Theory for Art History, London and New York: Routledge.Fox, Kate (2004),Watching the English: The Hidden Rules of English Behaviour , London:

Hodder and Stoughton.Hall, Stuart and Paddy Whannel (1964),The Popular Arts, London: Hutchinson

Educational.Hitchcock, Louise A. (2008),Theory for Classics: A Students Guide, London and

New York: Routledge.Lynch, Gordon (2007),The New Spirituality: An Introduction to Progressive Belief in

the Twenty-First Century, London: I.B.Tauris.Schechner, Richard (2002),Performance Studies: An Introduction,London and New

York: Routledge. (2008), Plagiarism, Greed and the Dumbing Down of Performance Studies

www.interegnum.dk/pdf/Plagiarism%20and%20Performance%20Stusdies%20DRAFT%202pdf. Accessed 8 September 2008.

iek, Slavoj (1999),The Ticklish Subject, London: Verso. (2000),The Fragile Absolute or Why is the Christian Legacy Worth Fighting for?

London: Verso. (2001),On Belief,London: Routledge. (2003),The Puppet and the Dwarf: The Perverse Core of Christianity, Cambridge,

MA: MIT Press.

Suggested citationGoldingay, S. (2009), Plagiarising theory: performance and religion?,Studies in

Theatre and Performance29: 1, pp. 514, doi: 10.1386/stap.29.1.5/1

Contributor Details

Sarah Goldingay is an AHRC-funded PhD researcher in the Exeter University DramaDepartment. Her research is concerned with how contemporary British spiritualityis constructed and reconstructed by performance. She is also a researcher on theIan Ramsey Pilgrimageproject at Oxford University, a director of the HowardBarker Research fund and an Associate of the Wrestling School. She continues towork as a performance practitioner.E-mail: [email protected]


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