Performance practices as a laboratory for shaping language ideologies

-   Claire French, Dramaturgy and Musicology, Aarhus University

This presentation conceptualises performance practices as a laboratory for not just looking at how language ideologies shape voice and interaction, but how performance shapes language ideologies.

Drawing on two theatre projects from Johannesburg - Micia de Wet’s Father, my Father (2017) and my collaborative project Languaging (2021) with Sibusiso Mkhize - I show how dramaturgies and pedagogies including language-ideological consciousnes-raising and improvisation, reshape standardised and institutional language ideologies. Across two filmed episodes of interactions within each of the projects, I trace shifts in indexed ideologies: From English as the ‘correct’ and separable language of performance and schooling, to institutionally ratified, negotiated varieties in which translanguaging becomes acceptable for interaction and artistic work. Methodologically, I combine interactional sociolinguistics with performance studies, analysing indexical cues, metapragmatic commentary, and moments of uptake/ratification that take into consideration voice and embodiment within the semiotic or phenomenal body. I conclude by proposing a transferable way to study how framed and performative interaction within an accumulative process can function as ideological ‘workshops’ for standard language ideologies.

The talk draws on my forthcoming monograph (Making Multilingual Performance, Routledge, 2026) and the Horizon Europe project Dramaturgies for Languaging (2024–2026).

Biography

Claire French is currently a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions Fellow in dramaturgy at Aarhus University, Denmark, and was previously Assistant Professor of Performance and Creative Practices at the University of Birmingham, UK. Her research investigates the ethics, aesthetics, and epistemologies of multilingual dramaturgies within socially engaged and ensemble traditions. With a methods-driven approach, she draws on sociolinguistics, decolonial theory, and performance studies to develop analytical strategies for identifying and rethinking how the body reproduces language ideologies.

French’s work spans a wide range of making practices, including performance training, community facilitation, ensemble devising, and playwriting. Her artistic practice deepens her inquiry through roles as facilitator, dramaturg, and playwright, with recent plays including Courage Songs (2024) and The tongue / Die tong (2025) with Mercy Kannemeyer. She is particularly focused on the geo-political consequences of storytelling that misrepresents the global majority, using multilingualism as a means to expand and enrich knowledge production.

More about Claire at clairefrench.com