Emer O'Toole, PhD

Introductions

I study theatre, performance, and film. 

My monograph, Contemporary Irish Theatre and Social Change: Activist Aesthetics (Routledge: 2023), digs into debates about aesthetic autonomy, taking care to start from first principles. My non-fiction book, Girls Will Be Girls (2015), makes Judith Butler's theory of gender performativity accessible and (I hope) interesting to a wide demographic.

I'm currently working on a series of performance lectures from the perspective of female Irish animals. Wolf has had two outings already, which is impressive for someone who's been extinct since 1786. Meanwhile, Swan is preening her feathers and hoping to land in spring. Cow is bringing up the rear, and might get here in 2026 or thereabout. (Really, what is tenure for, if not pretending to be a wolf zombie?)

I'm also a creative writer and theatremaker, and think that art is sometimes (often?) the best (only?) way to figure stuff out.

If you are a potential graduate student and would like to work with me, I'm particularly interested in supervising theatre and performance research, practice as research, and any work on gender, feminism, sexuality, interculturalism, aesthetics, or spooky shit. 

Education

My Ph.D (Royal Holloway, University of London, 2012) examined the ethics of intercultural theatre practice. The thesis can be downloaded in full here. 

Following my PhD, I spent a year working as a postdoctoral research assistant on the Indigeneity in the Contemporary World project, and retain a keen interest in first nations, aboriginal, and indigenous art and politics.

I hold an MPhil in Irish Theatre and Performance from Trinity College Dublin, as well as a BA in Philosophy and English Literature from the University of Galway. 

I have also worked in a lot of bars. Anyone who thinks this fact doesn't belong in the education section has never worked in a bar.

Courses

At 300 level I teach:
Classics of Irish Theatre
Irish Film
Irish Performance Studies
Contemporary Irish Theatre (a practice-based, devising class)
Intercultural Ireland
Irish Horror
 
At 200 level I teach:
Introduction to Irish Studies

At 800 level I teach:
Performance Studies

I also regularly supervise independent undergraduate field studies in Ireland

Please consult Concordia's class schedule tool (here) to see what I'm teaching this year

Books

Peer Reviewed Journal Articles

O'Toole, Emer. 'No Propaganda But.’ Art, Aesthetics, Activism, and THEATREclub’s Ireland Trilogy.' Contemporary Theatre Review 29.4, 2019.
---.'Panti Bliss Still Can’t Get Hitched: Meditations on Performativity, Drag, & Gay Marriage' Sexualities 22.3 2018
---. 'Guerilla Glamour: The Queer Tactics of Dr. Panti Bliss.' Eire-Ireland 52.4, 2017. 
---. 'Waking the Feminists: Re-imagining the Space of the National Theatre in the Era of the Celtic Phoenix.' Lit: Literature Interpretation Theory 28.2 (2017): 134-152.
---. ‘Cultural Capital in Intercultural Theatre: A Study of Pan Pan Theatre Company’s The Playboy of the Western World.’ Target 25.1 ,2013. P. 407- 426.
---. ‘Towards Best Intercultural Practice: A Study of Tim Supple’s Pan-Indian A 
Midsummer Night’s Dream.’ Journal of Adaptation in Film and Performance, 4.3, 2011. P. 289-302

Chapters

O'Toole, Emer, "The Mother of Us All," Redress: Ireland's Institutions and Transnational Justice. Ed. Katherine O'Donnell, Maeve O'Rourke, James M. Smith. Dublin: UCD Press, 2022, 57-67.
---. "The Intercultural Theatre Wars and The Playboy of the Western World: A New Version." The Playboy of the Western World: A New Version. Ed. Jason King and Matthew Spangler. Syracuse, 2023.
O'Toole Emer and Daniel O'Gorman. '“My Country Has Been Imagined Enough:” The Great Game, Neo-imperialism, and Gender.' Theatres of War: Contemporary Perspectives. Ed. Lauri Ramey. Metheun/Palgrave, 2022 
O'Toole, Emer. “Intercultural Adaptation: The Ethics of Peter Brook's 11 & 12.” Translation,  Adaptation and Dramaturgy: Ethics in Dialogue, Ethics in Action. Ed. Emer O’Toole, Andrea Kristic Pelegri and Stuart Young. Boston; Leiden: Brill, 2017

Book Reviews and Articles in Scholarly Journals Without a Review Committee

Bylines

The Guardian
The Irish Times

The Riot Ballet

With Noah Drew, Catalina Medina, Martin Andrew, Shawn Ketchum Johnson, and production/performance team. 

The Riot Ballet is an immersive theatre game/event exploring themes of activism, protest, extremism and riot.

Aug 21-25, 2019, Montréal, and Seattle, Sept 19-22, 2019.

Affiliations

I am a Fellow of the Mel Hoppenheim School of Cinema and of the Simone de Beauvoir Institute.

I am a member of the International Federation of Theatre Research (IFTR).