This book makes an urgent case for using performance studies to interrogate why debates over free speech and censorship have become a polarizing culture war topic in post-Brexit Britain. Rhetorical terms such as ‘cancel culture’ and ‘woke’ obscure the deep historical and cultural forces that determine how the public come to see certain arguments and forms of expression as either legitimate, transgressive, profane or harmful. Joseph Dunne-Howrie draws on a diverse body of theory from the fields of theatre, sociology, political science, and queer studies to argue that understanding the post-Brexit free-speech culture wars as a theatrically material practice make these forces critically legible. Performances by piss/CARNATION, DV8, Omar El-Khairy and Nadia Latif, Gillian Slovo, The Wooster Group, Brett Bailey and others are placed in critical dialogue with analyses of case studies from politics and media to offer fresh new insights into the complex role theatre and performance plays in shaping public perceptions of free speech and censorship.

Joseph Dunne-Howrie is Programme Director for MA/MFA Performance at Rose Bruford College, UK. He has published extensively in academic journals and edited collections on topics including immersive and participatory performance, theatre in lockdown, far-right conspiracy theories, culture wars, and performance archives. He runs the Gaming Democracy project with Tom Drayton.