First-of-its-kind Resource for Education and Research in Intercultural
and Shakespeare Performance
29 April 2011
"Asian performance cultures produce a rich diversity of interactions with the idea of Shakespeare embodied in his work-as classics of Western dramatic form; as the playwright with the strongest claim to universal appeal; as cultural capital; and as a supreme exemplar of the English language. A|S|I|A aims to expand awareness of how complex, evolved, and different these performances can be."
Assoc Prof Yong Li Lan from Department of English Language and Literature, Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences
ASIAN SHAKESPEARE INTERCULTURAL ARCHIVE: World's first multilingual online archive of East and Southeast Asian Shakespeare performance
LANGUAGE OPTIONS: Viewers can choose to read the production scripts in English, Chinese or Japanese
The world's first multilingual online archive of East and Southeast Asian Shakespeare performance, the Asian Shakespeare Intercultural Archive (A|S|I|A), was launched in March 2011 and can now be accessed at www.a-s-i-a-web.org
It is designed to create a body of theatre productions for comparative study and research. There are now 22 full-length Asian Shakespeare productions that can be watched through the online video streaming.
A|S|I|A is the product of two major Shakespeare projects involving expert scholars, practitioners and translators: "Relocating Intercultural Theatre", led by Assoc Prof Yong Li Lan and Dr Paul Rae at NUS Department of English Language and Literature; and "A Web Archive of Asian Shakespeare Productions", led by Prof Suematsu Michiko from Gunma University and Kobayashi Kaori from Nagoya City University. In all, the A|S|I|A team consists of over 40 scholars, editors and translators working in different languages in the region.
Production scripts are translated into English, Chinese and Japanese, and there are plans to offer Korean translations as well. Viewers watching a video can switch between languages in the accompanying text window which displays eight to ten lines at a time.
The detailed data in English, Chinese and Japanese is compiled according to a new metadata template for highlighting the unique intercultural profile of a performance. In terms of technology, A|S|I|A is at the forefront of new media; no online digital archive of this kind exists with customised applications for accessing performance materials in multiple languages. The latest feature is a notepad function for time-coded notes attached to each video. The viewer can read notes on the translation by the A|S|I|A team, and input his /her own notes with the options of keeping them private, making them accessible to a study group, or to everyone who watches the video.
By Victoria Louise Giaever-Enger, Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences