10 keywords I found can be divided into two categories, the first five are the characteristics of political spectacles, which explain “what” is political spectacles; the rest five focus on “how” to do political spectacles.
1, “us and them”
Art is political. Like in politics, to let art happen, there has to be an “us and them”，the power of “us” is predicated on the exclusion of the “them”.
2, “plural”
Political action is always plural, there is an anticipation for the control of adversity. Performance is by nature plural because it cannot happen without audiences.
3, “civility”
The idealism of hatred is the seeds of fascism, and the solution is to create a place for politics/performance, adding adversaries, not enemies. The political field has a nature of antagonism, so the notion of civility is to moderate the adversaries in this field.
4, “identity”
Identity is fluid and it is possible that everyone had multiple identities at different points in life. To become an anti-fascist, one has to become minoritarian.
5, “empathy”
Empathy is what Boal opposes in his writing, also consents the idea of Boal, Taylor thinks we should not equal empathy to illusion, but to take it as an essential way of approaching communication between performers and audiences.
6, “mimesis”
Aristotle’s interpretation of mimesis is representational, as the participatory politics is in contrast with representational politics, We have to get away with mimesis, and find an art/performance to do things that are not already done.
7, “alienation“
According to a more literary translation from its German origin, “alienation” means anti-illusionistic, the illusion Brecht aims at confronting is not only in theatrical terms but also the representative regime of art itself. Because Brecht thinks the representative art is something which confirms the existed social setting.
8, “animation/passion”
Political activities are for people with passions, so are performances. Based on her interpretation of empathy, Taylor developed the idea of “animation”, which is the core value of the performance and can be generated from both the audiences and the performers.
9. “Spect-actor”
Boal argues the fourth wall has not been torn down by Brecht because spectators are still on their seats. The spect-actor should get involved in the theatrical work by going on stage and does the symbolic trespass.
10, “feeling/affect”
Brecht claims that to realize the epistemological function of theatre in a scientific age, the “old affect “should be replaced by “alienation”, but in Taylor’s opinion, all kind of feelings provoked by performance is possible.