Abstract:

Czechs have animated the inanimate onstage through puppets, objects, and robots (R.U.R.) for centuries. More recently, a generation of theatre-makers has reversed that traditional imaginary, exploring possibilities within human-becoming-object that engage Peter Schumann’s assertion that “[o]bject exists only because we are deceived into being subject.” Through digital and material means, Czech “New Theatre” productions reconceive dormant Czech theatrical traditions to open space between subject and object that explores possibilities of being human beyond the boundaries that humanism’s binary definitions allow. Such rethinking has become urgent in an age when AI, technologically enhanced bodies, corporations recognized as “persons,” and anthropogenic global warming challenge previous understandings of human agency and composition. Drawing on puppetry studies and posthumanist theory, this essay analyzes the means used by three productions of Czech New Theatre to expose and yet imagine beyond the omissions, assumptions, and inequities within commonly accepted figurations of the human. Through digital puppets, physical composite characters, and transformations into objects, these productions question the composition of bodies and selves, seduction of the object, function of agency, and creation of character. They challenge us to consider how the exceptionalism, autonomy, and agency that humanism asserts for human subjects limits our ability to imagine being human otherwise. Illustrating how critical models of posthumanism can manifest onstage, the essay explores the process of human-becoming-object as one in which, contrary to humanist views, political and social agency can exist.

摘要：

捷克人通过木偶，物体和机器人在舞台上为无生命的动物制作了动画（RUR） 数百年。最近，一代戏剧制造者已经颠覆了传统的想象，探索了人类成为对象的可能性，这种可能性吸引了彼得·舒曼的断言：“对象的存在仅是因为我们被欺骗而成为主体”。通过数字和材料手段，捷克的“新剧院”作品重新构筑了休眠的捷克戏剧传统，在主体和客体之间开辟了空间，从而探索了超越人本主义二元定义所允许的人类可能性。在AI，技术增强型机构，被公认为“人”的公司以及人为的全球变暖挑战以前对人类代理和构成的理解的时代，这种重新思考已变得迫在眉睫。利用木偶研究和后人文主义理论，本文分析了捷克新剧院的三部作品所使用的手段，以揭露和想象超出人们公认的人类形象中的遗漏，假设和不平等。这些作品通过数字化的木偶，物理的合成角色以及向对象的转化，对身体和自我的构成，对象的诱惑，代理的功能以及角色的创造提出质疑。他们向我们提出挑战，要考虑人本主义对人类主体的断言，自治和代理如何限制了我们以其他方式想象自己是人的能力。通过说明后人文主义的批判模式如何在舞台上得以体现，本文探讨了人类成为对象的过程，在这一过程中，与人本主义观点相反，可以存在政治和社会代理。