Category Archives: Workshops

Computational Theater Studies (CTS) #1: video/annotation

LMU Munich, Institute for Theater Studies, 4.- 6. October 2023,
organized by Ulf Otto (LMU Munich), Nora Probst (Univ. Cologne)

Live or not, the theater of today is shared, negotiated and remembered within digital cultures, inevitably being turned into data and subjected to computation.

Accordingly, theater research is confronted with digitalization not only as a topic and a framework of contemporary performances, but also as an epistemological game changer, potentially decentering canonical narratives, or on the contrary reinforcing older academic biases with newly industrial ones. Increasingly digital tools and computational approaches, already established in related disciplines, become employed by theater scholars, necessitating both a methodological exploration and a critical reflection of the changing epistemic technologies and related research practices. How to make sense of performance data?

Following up on a virtual workshop series we organized in 2022, we will address these issues by initiating a new hybrid series of workshops that will foster international and interdisciplinary exchange. We will bring together a small group of theater scholars with colleagues from neighboring disciplines like Film Studies and Art History on the one hand, and Computer Science and Machine Learning on the other. With this we are pursuing a trifold aim: to connect questions, approaches, and results of individual research projects, to collaboratively explore tools and practices hands-on and to explore possibilities for ensuing cooperation. For that aim, each workshop will focus on one specific data type and compile a corresponding data set, that will be shared among participants six months in advance for preparatory exploration and as a hands-on reference point during the workshop.

CTS#1 will open the series with a focus on performance recordings and explore how to make sense of video data from a Theater Studies point of view. Its focus will lie on practices of annotation, the defaults of available tools, and the potential use of computer vision algorithms. In particular, three topics will be addressed:

  • Manual annotation as a research practice: what features, what segmentations, what vocabularies do different research agendas employ?
  • Evaluating and comparing annotations: what standards and formats can be used to share, merge and further analyze results?
  • Publishing and referencing videos: what forms of publications, data models, research infrastructures are needed to reference performance snippets?

The workshop will take place on site in Munich. If you are interest in joining us, please contact ulf.otto [] lmu.de.

Computational methods for Theatre Studies #5: On space & performance

Wednesday, 13. Juli 2022, 16:00 CET

  • Eleni Bozia (University of Florida): Reading between the lines and touching the exhibits: How to reexperience classics and archaeology
  • Franziska Ritter (Technische Universität Berlin): Im/material Theatre Spaces the virtual reconstruction of Großes Schauspielhaus Berlin

Registration: https://lmu-munich.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJYuc-urqjMqHNF9EsHu4FCKA5Onryf6UyGE

Computational Methods for Theatre Studies #4: On motion & performance

Wednesday, June 29, 2022, 16:00-18:00 CET

  • Peter Broadwell (Stanford Libraries): Deep LearningBased Pose Estimation for Distant and Close Viewing of Performance Corpora
  • David Rittershaus (University of Applied Sciences Mainz): Computing Dance Movement: From Manual Annotation to Machine Learning

Registration: https://lmu-munich.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJcod-ivqzwoHtRXDd9EvE7PEEbrQrIcElw0

“Audiencing and Empathy” – Panel discussion with Prof. Matthew Reason, Ph.D., Kirsty Sedgman, Ph.D. and Prof. Dr. Ulf Otto (LMU).

Panel discussion with Prof. Matthew Reason, Ph.D., Kirsty Sedgman, Ph.D. and Prof. Dr. Ulf Otto at the Center for Advanced Studies (CAS) der LMU

Empathy has played a pivotal role in theatre since the 18th century. Owing to empathy, theatre evolved into an educational institution capable of establishing a new and liberal social order. In (literary) theory and the words of Schiller, it promised to unite “people of all circles, zones, and ranks” into “one single family”. With the theatrical day-to-day turning out to be much more complex, the question how audiences relate to performances is an intriguing topic. It inspires research and theatre practice.

  • Matthew Reason is a professor at the School of Performance and Media Production at York St. John University.
  • Kirsty Sedgman is a lecturer at the Institut for Theatre Studies at the University of Bristol.

The event will be livestreamed.

Registration is required for participation. If you are interested in our event, please contact us; you will then receive the information on how to participate in the livestream: E-Mail.

Computational Methods for Theatre Studies? Panel Series

An online panel series May-July 2022, organized by Ulf Otto (LMU Munich) and Nora Probst (Univ. of Paderborn)

Computational Methods for Theatre Studies?

From May 2022 until July 2022 a series of panels, organized by Ulf Otto (LMU Munich) and Nora Probst (University of Paderborn), starts to complement the existing Digital Humanities research in Theatre Studies on data models, repertoire data and agent networks with questions about the potentials and politics of computational methods for theater research.

Researchers and students of all levels and from all backgrounds are welcome to participate.

Time: Wednesday, 16:00 CET
Start: May 11, 2022
End: July 13, 2022
via Zoom (respective links for registration see programme)