Performing YouTube: Exploring the techniques of the vlogger and their potential in live performance

This Practice-as-Research PhD aims to analyse YouTube vlogs from a performance perspective and use the findings to inform the creation of live performance. YouTube is filled with examples of performance, but vlogs are specifically of interest as they are a direct product of the internet, and only exist in the digital world. Postdigital theory proposes that the binaries of digital vs. physical are no longer useful in analysing or conceptualising performance (Cramer 2015 and Causey 2016), whereas the manifestation of a digital from (vlogging), in the physical world would has the potential to be more practically and theoretically productive. With YouTube being a fairly recent media platform, it is not surprising that little has been written on it from a performance perspective. Andy Lavender (2016) has made a start by looking at different types of video on YouTube, different personas adopted by YouTubers, and other elements which contribute to performance on YouTube; but there is a gap of scholarship and practice in this area. YouTube is the second most visited website in the world (Alexa, 2017) and it seems imperative that we explore vlogging forms more closely as a mode of performance and in the context of live performance. The intersection of these two forms could result in new techniques for creating live performance and also allow space for critical reflection on vlogging as a form.

After undertaking a comprehensive review of a selection of YouTube vlogs, I want to identify the techniques and strategies used, and then apply them to live contemporary performance practice. The aim is not to translate the vlogging work to the stage, but rather see what happens when we use these digital techniques to create live performance and when this digital form (vlogging) begins to manifest physically as part of a live performance encounter.