Dr Daniel Johnston

PhD (Performance Studies) University of Sydney, 2008
MA/BA (Cantab.) (Philosophy) The University of Cambridge, 2007/2
BA (Honours) University of Sydney, 1999
BA (Media and Communications) Macquarie University, 1998

Lecturer
Room S109, Woolley Building, A20 Manning Rd

+61 2 9351 6846

Daniel Johnston is a Lecturer at the Department of Performance Studies, The University of Sydney and Associate Lecturer at the National Institute of Dramatic Art (NIDA), Sydney. He holds a PhD in Performance Studies from the University of Sydney and an MA in Philosophy from the University of Cambridge.

Research areas

Phenomenology and performance
Corporate performance
Intercultural performance / diversity in tertiary education
Performance analysis

Current projects

Acting Through Phenomenology: Consciousness as Being-in-the-World. This project contemplates the use of philosophical phenomenology in acting and performance-making; philosophy as a resource for artistic creation. Elsewhere I have considered how various approaches to acting could be understood as constituting ‘practical phenomenology’ but might the equation work the other way? How might one use Martin Heidegger’s Being and Time (Sein und Zeit), for instance, in order to approach a role?

Selected publications

Johnston, Daniel (Forthcoming October 2011) ‘Theatre-making as Aletheia: Rehearsal and the Production of Truth’, Theatre Research International (36:3).

Johnston, Daniel (Provisionally accepted), ‘Stanislavski the Phenomenologist’.

Fitzpatrick, Tim with Daniel Johnston. (2009) ‘Spaces, Doors and Places in Early Modern English Staging’, Theatre Notebook 63(1).

Johnston, Daniel (2004) 'Active Metaphysics', Philament, 4 (August). (Peer reviewed online journal).

Johnston, Daniel (2010) ‘Phenomenology, Time and Performance’ The Proceedings of the Time, Transcendence, Performance Conference, Monash University, 2009.

Johnston, Daniel (2008) ‘Overcoming the Metaphysics of Performance: Being/Artaud’ in The Proceedings of the 2006 Australasian Drama Studies Conference (peer reviewed).

Recent Conference Papers

IFTR/FIRT (International Federation for Theatre Research)
St Petersburg, May 22-27, 2004 (‘Active Metaphysics: Phenomenology and Theatre’);
Maryland June 26 - July 1, 2005 ('Brecht, Theatre, Phenomenology')
Helsinki, August 7-12, August, 2006 (‘Overcoming the Metaphysics of Consciousness: Being/Artaud’)
Lisbon, 12-18 July 2009 (‘Acting, Consciousness and Aletheia’).

ADSA (The Australasian Association for Theatre Drama and Performance Studies)
Sydney July 4-7, 2006 (‘Overcoming the Metaphysics of Consciousness: Being/Artaud’)
Canberra, June 29 – July 2, 2010 (‘Corporate Performance Incorporated’).

The Politics and Aesthetics of Refusal
The University of Sydney, April 15, 2005 (‘Being-there: Stanislavski’s Acting Theory and the Refusal of Being’)

SSLA (Sydney Society for Literature and Aesthetics) – Heidegger and the Aesthetics of Living
December 12-14, 2005 (‘Brecht and Heideggerian Temporality’)

Time, Transcendence, Performance
Monash University, Melbourne, October 1-3, 2009 (‘Phenomenology, Time and Performance’) which was a fully peer reviewed conference.

From 2003 I have been a regular presenter at the University of Sydney Department of Performance Studies research seminars and this year presented at the Macquarie University MMCS Work in Progress seminars on the topic of Corporate Performance.

Areas of teaching

PRFM 3620 Performance Production Internship (Semesters 1&2, 2011)
PRFM 2601 Being There: Introduction to Performance Studies (Semester 2, 2011)
PRFM 2602 Performance Production and Interpretation (Semester 2, 2011)
PRFM 2606 Between Impro & Text
PRFM 3606 Approaches to Acting (Tutor, Semester 2010)

The University of Sydney - Department of Performance Studies