Courtney Colligan

  • Teaching Assistant Professor

Courtney E. Colligan earned a PhD in Theatre and Performance Studies from Pitt, an M.A. in English from Virginia Tech, and a B.A. in Theatre and English Literature from Christopher Newport University. Her dissertation, “Weary of these Worldly Bars: The Praxis of Postcarceral Performance in the United Kingdom and the United States,” articulates the emergence of a new performance practice, postcarceral performance, that serves the formerly incarcerated population. This practice, indebted to prison theatre, focuses on the transient space among prison release and reintegration into society. She argues how these programs function as a means of employment and reconceptualizing of the self post-incarceration. This project highlights organizations that rewrite carceral narratives by centering those impacted by the criminal justice system.

As an interdisciplinary scholar, Courtney uses performance to deconstruct social, artistic, and political institutions. She has devoted her research to forwarding performance forms that mainstream narratives have forgotten or suppressed. Her research interests range from cross-gender performance, historiographical narratives in and on public institutions, and abolitionist futures. Courtney has worked in museums, special collection archives, theatres, and prisons with a focus on illuminating historically marginalized voices. She currently serves as the Executive Director of the Unit Literacy Group, a rehabilitative literacy group for incarcerated individuals out of SCI Somerset.