Nations, identities, and theatres: Reflections on the concepts of national theatre in Europe
Nations, identities, and theatres: Reflections on the concepts of national theatre in Europe

Summary/Abstract: In my paper I shall investigate the major changes in the concept of the national theater from the early debates on the Hamburg Theater in 1767 until the 2005 establishment of the National Theater of Scotland. The starting assumption is that while in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries the notion of the national theater was regarded as a means for the integration of a nation or even an empire in most Western-European countries, in Eastern-Europe, the debates on and later the realization of the national theaters took place within the context of and against oppressive imperiums. In Eastern Europe, the realization of National Theater was utilised for representing a unified nation in a virtual way, and its role was to maintain national identity and national culture. In present day Scotland, however, the notion of the national theater has changed again as the National Theater is used to represent a diverse and multicultural Scotland.

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