Dr. K.K. (Kasia) Lech
- Nieuwe Doelenstraat 16-18
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Postbus 93065
1090 BB Amsterdam
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Profile
Kasia Lech, with a PhD from University College Dublin, is a scholar, actor, storyteller, dramaturg, and puppeteer with twenty years of conservatory and university teaching experience in the UK, Ireland, Poland, and Netherlands. This is enhanced by two decades of applied arts projects and interdisciplinary research collaborations with diverse communities and non-academic organizations worldwide. Her research and creative practice – supported by Polish, British, Irish, and Canadian organizations – explore theatre through practice-based and traditional scholarship and primarily focus on verse, multilingualism, translation, migration, and cross-cultural encounters. These areas bring to the fore the dialogue between historical and contemporary performance practices in the multivoiced world and theatre within it. Kasia published Dramaturgy of Form: Performing Verse in Contemporary Theatre (Routledge, 2021), which received outstanding reviews for its content, critical quality, and decolonizing scholarship on verse. Her second book Multilingual Dramaturgies: Towards New European Theatre (Palgrave 2024) was described as "profoundly impactful" in its engagement with how "European theatre performs, understands, and re-imagines difference." She is currently researching multilingualism in acting training and in theatre for young audiences. Kasia is also part of funded research projects on mapping Polish migrant theatre worldwide and on historical and present violence in Polish theatre. Kasia performed internationally and co-founded Polish Theatre Ireland – a multilingual theatre company based in Dublin. She is an Executive Director at TheTheatreTimes.com, a global theatre portal which seeks to decolonize theatre criticism. TheTheatreTimes.com won the 2024 ATHE-ASTR Award for Excellence in Digital Scholarship from the Association for Theatre in Higher Education, and the American Society for Theatre Research and was the second-place winner of the 2021 Culture Online International Award for “Best Online Project” for its International Online Theatre Festival (IOTF); and received the 2018 Elliott Hayes Award for Outstanding Achievement in Dramaturgy from the Literary Managers and Dramaturgs of the Americas (LMDA.org). Kasia is an affiliate of metaLAB (at) Harvard & FU Berlin.
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Publications
2025
- Lech, K. K. (2025). Assembling Diverse Voices: Female Migrant Artists in the British Theatre System. In The Methuen Drama Handbook of Women in Contemporary British Theatre Methuen.
2024
- Lech, K. K. (2024). Multilingual Dramaturgies: Towards New European Theatre. (New Dramaturgies). Palgrave Macmillan.
2023
- Lech, K. (2023). Sonless Mothers and Motherless Sons or How Has Polishness Haunted Polish Theatre Artists in Exile? In Y. Meerzon, & S. E. Wilmer (Eds.), The Palgrave Handbook of Theatre and Migration (pp. 291-301). (Palgrave handbooks). Palgrave Macmillan. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-20196-7_23 [details]
Lech, K. (2023). Wielojęzyczny teatr europejski: próba zarysu. Didaskalia, 173, 6-26. https://doi.org/10.34762/Y6J0-ZH55 [details]- Lech, K. K. (2023). „1989”: wielogłosowość infranarracji a pamięć zbiorowa o polskiej walce o wolność. Didaskalia, (177), 192-200. https://didaskalia.pl/pl/artykul/1989-wieloglosowosc-infranarracji-pamiec-zbiorowa-o-polskiej-walce-o-wolnosc
2022
- Lech, K. K. (2022). Focus: Ukraine II. Critical Stages/Scènes critiques, (25). https://www.critical-stages.org/25/category/focus-ukraine-2/
- Lech, K. K. (2022). Ukraine Theatre: Pasts, Presents, and Futures. Critical Stages/Scènes critiques, (25). https://www.critical-stages.org/25/ukraine-theatre-pasts-presents-and-futures/
2021
- Lech, K. K. (2021). Dramaturgy of Form: Performing Verse in Contemporary Theatre. (Focus on Dramaturgy). Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group.
- Lech, K. K. (2021). Krytyczki as Activists: on Theatre Criticism, Affect, Objectivism, and #Metoo in Polish Drama Schools. Interview with Monika Kwaśniewska. Critical Stages/Scènes critiques, (23). https://www.critical-stages.org/23/interview-with-monika-kwasniewska/
2020
- Lech, K. (2020). Roughening up of the utterance” or “It’s not all mountains and sheep and Emily Dickinson.”: How Contemporary Practitioners Test Boundaries of Verse Drama? Coup de Théâtre, (34), 161-179.
- Lech, K. K. (2020). Lockdown Verses and Anxieties of Presence: How Polish Theatre Rhymed a Case for Its Purpose on the Pandemic Stage? Critical Stages/Scènes critiques, (22). https://www.critical-stages.org/22/lockdown-verses-and-anxieties-of-presence-how-polish-theatre-rhymed-a-case-for-its-purpose-on-the-pandemic-stage/
- University, C. (2020). Claiming Their Voice: Foreign Memories on the Post-Brexit British Stage. In Y. Meerzon, D. Dean, & D. McNeil (Eds.), Migration and Stereotypes in Performance and Culture (pp. 215-234). Palgrave Macmillan. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-39915-3_12
2019
- Lech, K. K. (2019). Acting as the Act of Translation: Domesticating and Foreignizing Strategies as Part of the Actor’s Performance in the Irish-Polish Production of "Bubble Revolution”. In Y. Meerzon, & K. Pewny (Eds.), Dramaturgy of Migration: Staging Multicultural Encounters in Contemporary Theatre (pp. 39-50). Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group. https://www.taylorfrancis.com/chapters/edit/10.4324/9781351270267-5/acting-act-translation-kasia-lech
2018
- Lech, K. K. (2018). Verse in Contemporary Irish Theatre . Ed. . Palgrave, pp. 599-613. In E. Jordan, & E. Weitz (Eds.), The Palgrave Handbook of Contemporary Irish Theatre Palgrave Macmillan. https://link.springer.com/book/10.1057/978-1-137-58588-2
2017
- Lech, K. K., Hoople, L., Abiker, K., Mitchell, M., & Mooney, P. (2017). Students as Producers and Active Partners in Enhancing Equality and Diversity: Culturosity at Canterbury Christ Church University.” Principal Investigator. Journal of Educational Innovation, Partnership and Change, 3(2). https://journals.studentengagement.org.uk/index.php/studentchangeagents/article/view/533
2015
- Lech, K. K. (2015). Difficult Encounter: Polish Theatre on the Irish Stage between 2004 and 2015. Litteraria Pragensia, (50), 32-46.
- Lech, K. K. (2015). Pain, Rain, and Rhyme: the Role of Rhythm in Stefanie Preissner’s Work. In M. Haughton, & M. Kurdi (Eds.), Radical Contemporary Theatre Practices by Women in Ireland (pp. 151-166). Peter Lang.
- Lech, K. K. (2015). Puppets, Dogs, and Vegetarian Angels: Ecocriticism in Jakub Krofta’s Polish productions. Theatralia/Yorick, 18(2), 277-302. https://digilib.phil.muni.cz/handle/11222.digilib/134427
2014
- Lech, K. K. (2014). Memory, Communism, and Foreign Words in "Foreign Bodies": Balancing Foreignization and Domesticating Strategies in Polish Theatre Ireland’s production of Julia Holewińska’s play. Translation Ireland, 19(2), 37-48. https://www.translatorsassociation.ie/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/Translation-Ireland-Polish-Irish-Issues-in-Translation.pdf
- Lech, K. K. (2014). Metatheatre and the Importance of Estrella in Calderón’s "La vida es sueño" and its Contemporary Productions. Bulletin of the Comediantes, 66(2), 175-193. https://doi.org/10.1353/boc.2014.0036
2024
- Lech, K. K. (2024). Make Your Classroom Multilingual: On Training Students For Rapidly Changing Cultural Landscapes. TheTheatreTimes.com. https://thetheatretimes.com/make-your-classroom-multilingual-on-training-students-for-rapidly-changing-cultural-landscapes/
- Lech, K. K. (2024). Multilingual Theatre For/With Young Audiences: On the Jeune Théâtre Européen Jeunes Publics Project. TheTheatreTimes.com. https://thetheatretimes.com/multilingual-theatre-for-with-young-audiences-on-the-jeune-theatre-europeen-jeunes-publics-project/
- Lech, K. K. (2024). Towards New Theatre in Europe: What Roles Can Multilingual Dramaturgies Play in Europe’s Future(s)? TheTheatreTimes.com. https://thetheatretimes.com/towards-new-theatre-in-europe-what-roles-can-multilingual-dramaturgies-play-in-europes-futures/
- Lech, K. K., & Romanska, M. (2024). TheTheatreTimes.com: Towards Transnational Digital Infrastructure. TheTheatreTimes.com. https://thetheatretimes.com/thetheatretimes-com-towards-transnational-digital-infrastructure/
2023
- Lech, K. K. (2023). Polish People Deserve Better from Irish Theatre. TheTheatreTimes.com. https://thetheatretimes.com/polish-people-deserve-better-from-irish-theatre/
2022
- Lech, K. K. (2022). Theatre as Shelter: on Artists' in Ukraine (And Beyond) Response to the Russian Invasion. TheTheatreTimes.com. https://thetheatretimes.com/theatre-as-shelter-on-artists-in-ukraine-response-to-the-russian-invasion/
Prize / grant
- Lech, K. (2024). ATHE-ASTR Award for Excellence in Digital Scholarship. https://www.athe.org/page/24_digitalawardee
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Ancillary activities
No ancillary activities
Lech, K. (2023). Wielojęzyczny teatr europejski: próba zarysu. Didaskalia, 173, 6-26.