BETWEEN A RACCOON AND A GYPSY: A STREET ACTOR IN SEARCH OF A LOST IDENTITY

Authors

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.34680/EISCRT-2025-2(11)-39-71

Keywords:

street actor, booth, buffoon, professional identity, self-presentation, clown, stigma, self-parody, self-stigmatization, E. Goffman

Abstract

The subject of the study is the self-presentation of street theatre figures in modern media culture and its connection with professional identity. The appeal to this topic is due to the fact that the art of street theatre is often associated with a number of deviations, making it difficult to outline its contours within the framework of traditional forms of theatrical activity. The hypothesis of the study is the assumption of the existence of two dominant types of professional self-presentation of Russian street theater figures, the first of which is in direct connection with professional identification, and the second is deliberately distanced from it due to its stigmatization.The following served as the material for the analysis of self-presentation of street theatre representatives: online communication of street theatre figures, digital presentation of creativity, and a survey. The methodological framework of the study was based on E. Goffman's concept of stigma. As a result of the study, the hypothesis about two dominant types of professional self-presentation was not fully confirmed. In most self-presentations of street theatre figures, a desire to demonstrate comic self-parody is revealed as an obvious privilege of their profession. Laughter self-reflection of their professional activity, reflected in humorous self-stigmatization, allows classifying a modern street actor as a representative of the informal institution of destigmatization of street art, which traditionally includes buffoons, showmen, jesters and clowns.

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.

Author Biography

Elena Semenova, Noncommercial partnership “Theatre-EX”, Moscow, Russia

Candidate of Pedagogical Sciences, Director of Noncommercial partnership «Theatre-EX»,
e-mail: semenova05@list.ru

 

References

Aranda, A., Helms, W., Patterson, K., Roulet, T., & Hudson, B. (2023). Standing on the shoulders of Goffman: Advancing a relational research agenda on stigma. Business and Society, 62 (7), 1339–1337. https://doi.org/10.1177/00076503221148441

Aristotle (1927). Poetics. Leningrad: Academia Publ. (In Russian).

Berlyne, D. E. (1972). Humor and its kin. In Goldstein J. H. & McGhee P. E. (Eds.). The Psychology of Humor (pp. 43–60). New York: Academic.

Bitsadze, G. E. (2018). Street as a crime scene. Bulletin of the Kaliningrad branch of the St. Petersburg University of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia, 4(54), 133–136. (In Russian).

Bos, A., Pryor, J., Reeder, G., & Stutterheim, S. (2013). Stigma: Advances in Theory and Research. Basic and Applied Social Psychology, 35 (1), 1–9. https://doi.org/10.1080/01973533.2012.746147

Braidotti, R. (2013). The posthuman. Cambridge: Polity Press.

Braydotti, R. (2021). Posthuman: translated from English. Moscow: Gaidar Institute Publ. (In Russian).

Brower, K. J. (2021). professional stigma of mental health issues: physicians are both the cause and solution. Academic Medicine, 96 (5), 635–640. https://doi.org/10.1097/ACM.0000000000003998

Buffoons in written monuments (2007). St. Petersburg: Nestor-History Publ. (In Russian).

Donley, A., & Jackson, E. (2014). Blending in: the presentation of self among homeless males in a gentrifying environment. Theory in Action, 7 (1), 46–64. https://doi.org/10.3798/tia.1937-0237.14003

Goffman, E. (1963). Stigma notes on the management of spoiled identity. Englewood Cliffs (New Jersey): Prentice-Hall, Inc.

Goffman, E. (2017). Behavior in public places: notes on the social organization of gatherings. Moscow: Elementary forms Publ. (In Russian).

Gouabault, E., Dubied, A., & Burton-Jeangros, C. (2011). Genuine Zoocentrism or Dogged Anthropocentrism? On the Personification of Animal Figures in the News. Humanima lia, 3, 77–100. https://doi.org/10.52537/humanimalia.10059

Lipovetsky, M. (2011). Charms of the cynical reason: the trickster’s transformations in Soviet and Post-Soviet culture. Boston: Academic Studies Press.

Mao, Y. (2017). Qualitative meanings of relative adjectives with spatial semantics. Philological Sciences. Theory and Practice, 12(78), 109–114. (In Russian).

Moder, G. (2014). What Althusser can teach us about street theater – and vice versa. Stasis, 2 (1), 92–104. (In Russian).

Nekita, A. G., & Malenko, S. A. (2024). “Cheburashka’s” game of “Easter eggs”: from cinematic simulations of a leisure paradise to the destruction of national identity. Experience Industries. Sociocultural Research Technologies (EISCRT), 4 (9), 88–131. https://doi.org/10.34680/EISCRT-2024-4(9)-88-131 (In Russian).

Pavis, P. (1991). Dictionary of theater: translated from French. Moscow: Progress Publ. (In Russian).

Pefanis, G. P. (2014). The streets belong to the people: scenes and heterotopias in the city. Gramma: Journal of Theory and Criticism, 22 (2), 179–187. https://doi.org/10.26262/GRAMMA.V22I2.6263

Semenova, E. A. (2023). Street theatre in the context of foreign concepts of carnival culture. National Psychological Journal, 3, 25–34. https://doi.org/10.11621/npj.2023.0304 (In Russian).

Sinitskaya, A. V. (2011). Werewolves in reverse: zoomorphs in subcultural practices (verbal and visual text). The beast as a sign. Interpretation of cultural codes 2011: Conference proceedings, Saratov, June 24-26, 2010 (pp. 72-87). Saratov, St. Petersburg: LISKA Publ. (In Russian).

Sokolov, M. M. (2007). Online diary, theories of virtual identity and modes of disclosure of personal information. In Personality and interpersonal interaction on the Internet. Blog posts: the new reality: a collection of articles (pp. 9–39). St. Petersburg: St. Petersburg State University Publ. (In Russian).

Stanton, R. R. (2021). The disneyfication of animals. The Palgrave Macmillan Animal Ethics Series. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-49316-5

The Theatre Which Must Not Be Named. Russian Union of Street Theaters and Artists: website. Available at: https://goo.su/Tj963c (accessed: 10.02.2025). (In Russian).

Uvarova, I. P. (2018). A story about one house. Moscow: A. A. Bakhrushin State Central Theatre Museum Publ. (In Russian).

Zhang, Yu. (2023). Goffman on professional self-presentation: the key issues of streamers’ professional identity construction. Proceedings of the 2nd International Conference on Humanities, Wisdom Education and Service Management (HWESM 2023) (pp. 134–140). https://doi.org/10.2991/978-2-38476-068-8_19

Downloads


Abstract views: 15

Published

2025-06-26

How to Cite

Semenova, E. (2025). BETWEEN A RACCOON AND A GYPSY: A STREET ACTOR IN SEARCH OF A LOST IDENTITY. Experience Industries. Socio-Cultural Research Technologies, 2 (11), 2025, 39–71. https://doi.org/10.34680/EISCRT-2025-2(11)-39-71

Issue

No. 2 (11), 2025: Experience industries. Socio-Cultural Research Technologies

Section

Traditions