Professor Christopher Balme
Professor Christopher Balme is Leverhulme Visiting Professor in Theatre at The Royal Central School of Speech and Drama

We are delighted to announce that Professor Christopher Balme will be joining Central this year as our first Leverhulme Visiting Professor.

Professor Balme currently holds the chair in Theatre Studies at the University of Munich. He is well-known for a series of ground-breaking studies, including, Decolonizing the Stage: Theatrical Syncretism and Postcolonial Drama (Oxford UP, 1999); Pacific Performances: Theatricality and Cross-Cultural Encounter in the South Seas (Palgrave Macmillan, 2007); and The Theatrical Public Sphere (Cambridge UP, 2014).  He is also a former president of the International Federation of Theatre Research.

Professor Balme will be joining Central for two periods of secondment – the first, commencing in February 2017, and the second, commencing in February 2018. As a Leverhulme Visiting Professor, he will give a series of Leverhulme talks at Central and in universities and public events around the UK; he will mentor both researchers and research degrees students at Central; and he will lead on a major international conference to take place at Central in April 2018 on the theme of Theatre and European institutional crisis.

Professor Balme commented, “I am excited to be at Central and to be part of its vibrant research and artistic culture. I am looking forward to interacting with staff and students”.

Professor Maria Delgado, Director of Research at Central, added, “We are delighted to welcome a paradigm shifting theatre historian to Central. With interests in actor networks, historiography, the politics of globalisation and the artistic currency of neo-liberalism, we look forward to the debates and discussions that will develop from his time with us.”

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