A contemporary overview of festival activity from around the world based on over 30 case studies drawn from every continent. Through its case-study focus it examines different types and genres of festival across the world; considers in detail specific festivals in specific contexts; looks at management and organisational issues in festival provision, and illustrates debates and theories pertaining to festivals throughout the world.

Table of Contents

• Notes on Contributors
• Preface - Chris Newbold and Jennie Jordan
• Introduction: Focusing on World Festivals - Chris Newbold and Jennie Jordan
• Section 1: Understanding Festivals
• Introduction - Jennie Jordan
• 1 The Festivalisation of Contemporary Life - Jennie Jordan
• 2 The Place to be… global! The ‘glocal’ configuration of world festivals: The case of Les Eurockéennes de Belfort, France - Aurélien Djakouane and Emmanuel Négrier
• 3 Norwegian Festivals and a Music Economy in Transition: The art of balancing ambitions, expectations and limitations - Daniel Nordgård
• 4 Visual Arts Festivals and Globalisation: The rise of biennials - Monica Sassatelli
• 5 Animating Places: A new festival phenomenon? - Maurice Maguire
• 6 Republic of the Imagination: Burning Man and the culture of radical self-expression - Rachel Bowditch
• Section 2: Managing Festivals: Policy, Impact and People
• Introduction - Jennie Jordan
• 7 Leicester: ‘Festival City,’ or a City with Festivals? - Simon Brown
• 8 Perspective of Taiwan Lantern Festival - Alison Shin-Yi Huang
• 9 Galway International Arts Festival: What's behind the internationalisation of a name? - Silvia Guglielmini
• 10 Rock in Rio: The Festival - Vanessa Martin
• 11 Building the Festival Team: A case study of Saint Petersburg art festivals - Svetlana Puchkova and Elena Elkanova
• 12 Large Festivals-Great Struggles - János Zoltán Szabó
• 13 Community Perceptions on the Impacts of Art Festivals on Overall Quality of Life: A case study of the Innibos National Arts Festival, South Africa - Mathilda van Niekerk
• 14 Valuing Arts Festivals: A case study of the South African National Arts Festival - Jen D. Snowball
• 15 Festivals on the High Street: Revitalising business and communities in the UK - Roberta Comunian, Lydia Fraser-Ward and Silvie Jacobi
• 16 Are You Having a Laugh? Comedy and Festivals in the 21 st Century - Christopher Maughan and Ljiljana Radošević
• Section 3: Using Festivals: Culture and Identity
• Introduction - Chris Newbold
• 17 ‘Appealing for Grace’: The Guinea Corn Festival of the Nawuris of Northern Ghana - Samuel Aniegye Ntewusu
• 18 Visualising National Life:The Hornbill Festival as Culture and Politics - Arkotong Longkumer
• 19 The World's Largest Water Fight, or the Battle for the Soul of a Festival: Songkran in Thailand and South East Asia - Chris Newbold
• 20 China: Rehabilitating Festivals - Chris Newbold and Meng Xiang
• 21 Festivals that Change Lives - Floriane Gaber
• 22 A Holy Week Carnival? The Iberoamerican Theater Festival of Bogotá - Paolo Vignolo
• 23 Dia de los Muertos and its Representation of Calaveras - Emily Bradfield
• 24 Commemorating the Ancestors: Performances of death at the Tucson All Souls’ Procession - Rachel Bowditch
• 25 Off the Beaten Track - Robyn Archer
• 26 The Parkes Elvis Festival: Attendee and Host Community Perspectives - Katie Schlenker, Carmel Foley and Eve Carroll-Dwyer
• 27 ‘We have been called Carnival People’: The Festive Culture of Trinidad and Tobago - Milla Cozart Riggio
• Index