Theater Studies

Sean Metzger, Assistant Professor of English and Theater Studies

Research Interests:: Sean Metzger is generally interested in the intersections of gender, sexuality, race, ethnicity and national belonging as constructed through film, theatre and performance. Trained as a comparatist before moving his doctoral studies to a theatre department, Metzger continues to teach broadly in (and out of) the Western dramatic canon as well as late 19th-21st century American and Francophone literature and cinema. His writing focuses on Asian/ American cultural production, with an emphasis on US-China relations and the Chinese diaspora. At Duke, Metzger is affiliated with the Asian/ Pacific Studies Institute, the program in Film/Video/ Digital and the program in Women’s Studies as well as the departments of English and Theatre Studies. In 05-06, he will convene a Critical US Studies seminar “Race-ing Through Intersections” and serve as co-director for the Center for Asian and Asian American Studies with the fabulous Anne Allison. Prior to his arrival in the South, Metzger served as adjunct faculty at Antioch University (BA program), Loyola Marymount University (departments of American Cultures and Theatre) and the USC School of Theatre. He also spent three years working in social services at the LA Gay & Lesbian Center and as an independent consultant to school districts and other non-profit institutions. A closeted actor and director, Metzger occasionally creeps on or behind stage.

Education:

PhD	University of California at Davis	2005
MA	University of Southern California	1998
BA	University of Colorado at Boulder	1995

Recent Publications (More Publications)

S. Metzger, "The Provincetown Players and the Culture of Modernity; Avant-Garde Performance and the Limits of Criticism: Approaching the Living Theatre, Happenings/Fluxus, and the Black Arts Movement; Performance in America: Contemporary U.S. Culture and the Performing Arts". American Literature 79:4 (December, 2007).
S. Metzger, "Double Agency: Acts of Impersonation in Asian American Literature and Culture and Americans First: Chinese Americans and the Second World War". American Literature 79:1 (March, 2007): 201-203.
with Gina Masequesmay, Embodying Asian/ American Sexualities (under review) .
S. Metzger, The Little (Chinese) Mermaid: Importing "Western" Femininity in Lou Ye's Suzhou he (Suzhou River), in How East Asian Films Are Reshaping National Identities: Essays on the Cinemas of China, Japan, South Korea, and Hong Kong, edited by Andrew David Jackson, Michael Gibb, and Dave White (2007), pp. 135-154, The Edwin Mellen Press .
"Yellowface: Creating the Chinese in American Popular Music and Performance, 1850s-1920s and From Inner Worlds to Outer Space: The Multimedia Performances of Dan Kwong". TDR 50:192 (Winter, 2006).