Angela Ahlgren

Courses Taught:

• THFM 7680: Performance and Labor (Fall 2023)
• THFM 7680: Dance, Movement, and Politics
• THFM 6700: Asian American Theatre
• THFM 7670 Staging Race in the 19th-21st Centuries
• THFM 6590: Research Methods in Theater and Performance Studies
• THFM 7660: Marlowe in Performance
• THFM 6630: Introduction to Performance Studies
• THFM 3470: Theater History, Origins-1700
• THFM 3480: Theater History, 1700-Present
• THFM 6680: Queer Performance and Theory
• THFM 6700: Women and Performance in the Americas
• THFM 6630: Mourning and Performance
• THFM 6600: Theater and Performance in Cultural Contexts, Origins-1700
• THFM 6610: Theater and Performance in Cultural Contexts, 1700-Present
• THFM 1410: The Theatre Experience
• MUCT 3950: Workshop (Taiko Ensemble) in the College of Musical Arts (no longer offered)

Dr. Ahlgren teaches Theater History and Performance Studies in the graduate and undergraduate programs in Theatre and Film, and serves as Graduate Coordinator for the MA and PhD programs in Theatre. She is Affiliated Faculty in American Culture Studies and Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies. Her areas of interest include twentieth and twenty-first century Asian American theater and performance; critical perspectives on stage management, gender, and labor; critical dance studies; queer and feminist theater and performance; and the politics of mourning.

Dr. Ahlgren is VP of Awards for the Dance Studies Association (DSA) and co-chair of the Articles-in-Progress and Pitch Your book sessions for Mid-America Theatre Conference (MATC).

Before joining the BGSU faculty, Angela held faculty positions at Texas A&M University and Ohio University. She earned her PhD in Performance as Public Practice from the University of Texas at Austin.

Publications:

Book

Drumming Asian America: Taiko, Performance and Cultural Politics (Oxford, 2018).

Journal Articles

“Statecraft and Stagecraft: Spinning a Fantasy Japan in Balanchine’s Bugaku (1963).” Journal of Dramatic Theory and Criticism. Forthcoming.

“Editors’ Introduction: Commingled Histories: Theatre and Dance,” Theatre History Studies, v. 41, 2022, pp.

“Asia and Alwin Nikolais: An Interdisciplinary Analysis of Orientalist Tendencies in Totem (1960) and Imago (1963).” Theatre History Studies 40 (2021): 73-100.

“Butch Bodies, Big Drums: Queering North American Taiko.” Women and Music: A Journal of Gender and Culture, 20 (2016): 1-26.

“Christopher Marlowe’s ‘Unholy Fascination’: Performing Queer Edward II in the 1990s.” Journal of Dramatic Theory and Criticism 25.2 (Spring 2011): 5-21.

Book Chapters

“Theory Over Time: Asian American Performance, Critical Theory, and the Theater History Survey.” Teaching Critical Performance Theory in Today’s Theater Classroom, Studio, and Community. Edited by Jeanmarie Higgins. (Routledge, 2020), 38-50.

“Futari Tomo: A Queer Duet for Taiko.” Queer Dance: Meanings and Makings. Edited by Clare Croft. (Oxford University Press, 2017), 229-242.

“A New Taiko Folk Dance: San Jose Taiko and Asian American Movements.” New Directions in Asian American Dance. Edited by Yutian Wong. (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 2016), 29-61.

Special Sections Edited

Angela K. Ahlgren and Victoria Fortuna, eds. “Commingled Histories: Theatre and Dance,” special section of Theatre History Studies, v. 41, 2022.

Other Publications

“Ruth Mitchell, Stage Management, and Invisible Backstage Labor.” New York City Public Library for Performing Arts Blog.

Book Reviews

Review. Wong, Deborah. Louder and Faster: Pain, Joy, and the Body Politic in Asian American Taiko. Yearbook for Traditional Music 52 (November 2020), 217-219.

Review. Imada, Adria L. Aloha America: Hula Circuits Through the U.S. Empire. Theatre Journal 65.3 (October 2013): 445-447.

Review. Lee, Esther Kim. A History of Asian American Theater. Theatre Journal 61.1 (March 2009): 152-153.

Degrees:

PhD, Performance as Public Practice, University of Texas at Austin, 2011.

MA, English Literature, University of Minnesota, 2005.

BA, Theater Arts and English, Augsburg College, 1998.

For more info on this book, click:

 https://global.oup.com/academic/product/drumming-asian-america-9780199374021?lang=en&cc=us