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GEOGRAPHIES OF LEARNING: THEORY AND PRACTICE, ACTIVISM AND PERFORMANCE. By Jill Dolan. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 2001; pp ix + 209. $19.95 paper.
In her essay "Spatializing Feminism," geographer Linda McDowell notes the importance of examining connections between "material, symbolic, and discursive constructions of space, in situated theory, in imagined communities, in the social constructions of different visions of space, and in the performative and fictive nature of subjectivities and social relations." Analogously, Jill Dolan's Geographies of Learning: Theory and Practice, Activism and Performance prompts readers to interrogate attachments to and meanings of positionality in very specific material, symbolic, and discursive spaces: in disciplinary locations in academic departments of theatre and drama, English, performance studies, women's studies, gay/ lesbian/queer studies; in theatre and performance practice; and in political activism within and outside the academy.
Throughout this moving collection of essays, Dolan casts herself in the position of translator and mediator "in between" communities often fractured by (false) binaries. On the faultlines of tensions between academic advocates of "theory" and proponents of "practice," between performing artists and critics of performance, and between activists within and those outside of academic institutions, Dolan demonstrates the value of critical engagement, respectful code-switching, and ways in which a passionate commitment to advocacy for progressive causes coupled with serious regard for the process of teaching and learning can bridge ideological gaps.
Dolan starts with her own locations in women's...