%0 Journal Article
%T Destabilising Notions of the Unfamiliar in Australian Documentary Theatre: version 1.0¡¯s CMI (A Certain Maritime Incident)
%A Ulrike Garde
%J PORTAL : Journal of Multidisciplinary International Studies
%D 2013
%I 
%X This article offers a fresh analysis of Sydney-based version 1.0¡¯s theatre production CMI (A Certain Maritime Incident, 2004), which engaged with asylum seekers arriving by boat in the context of the so-called ¡®children overboard affair¡¯ and the maritime disaster, in which over 300 people from the SIEV X, a brittle Indonesian fishing boat, perished. The performance invited audiences to see the unfamiliar in themselves rather than in those frequently rejected as ¡®the other¡¯. In doing so, it questioned common notions of the unfamiliar that is perceived by audiences as different, foreign or insufficiently known, and interrupted a long tradition of opposing the familiar culture(s) of Australians and the unfamiliar culture(s) of the ¡®boat people¡¯. The article explores how version 1.0 used effectively a destabilisation of meaning, a playful inversion of socio-political responsibilities and challenged common notions of the roles of fact and fiction in order to offer an alternative perspective on public events, thus making an important contribution to Australia¡¯s communicative memory of issues that continue to be pertinent beyond Australian borders.
%K documentary theatre
%K the unfamiliar
%K refugees and asylum seekers
%K memory
%K fact and fiction
%U http://epress.lib.uts.edu.au/journals/index.php/portal/article/view/2450