Loving Big Brother: Surveillance Culture and Performance Space

by John McGrath

Overview

In Loving Big Brother the author tackles head on the overstated claims of the crime-prevention and anti-terrorism lobbies. But he also argues that we desire and enjoy surveillance, and that, if we can understand why this is, we may transform the effect it has on our lives. This book looks at a wide range of performance and visual artists, at popular TV shows and movies, and at our day-to-day encounters with surveillance, rooting its arguments in an accessible reading of cultural theory.

Constant scrutiny by surveillance cameras is usually seen as - at best - an invasion of privacy, and at worst an infringement of human rights. But in this radical new account of the uses of surveillance in art, performance and popular culture, John E McGrath sets out a surprizing alternative: a world where we have much to gain from the experience of being watched.

This iconoclastic book develops a notion of surveillance space - somewhere beyond the public and the private, somewhere we will all soon live. It's a place we're just beginning to understand.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780415275385
Publisher:	Taylor & Francis
Publication date:	01/30/2004
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	256
Product dimensions:	5.44(w) x 8.50(h) x (d)

About the Author

John E. McGrath is Artistic Director of Manchester’s groundbreaking Contact Theatre, which brings bold new performance to diverse young audiences. He has directed work by Lemn Sissay, Jeff Noon and others. In both theatre and theoretical work he focuses on the intersections of space, media and language.

Table of Contents

Introduction; Chapter 1 An Ideology of Crime; Chapter 2 Perverting Privacy; Chapter 3 Accidental Death; Chapter 4 Dimensions, Doubles and Data; Chapter 5 Staging the Spectator; Chapter 6 Encountering Surveillance;

Editorial Reviews

'An essential text for understanding the complexity of modern life under surveillance' - Prefix Photo

From the Publisher