Exciting new scholarship has been emerging as performance studies scholars begin to turn their attention to the performance of politics, nationhood, and jurisprudence. Branislav Jakovljevic?s project on the history and eventual demise of the former Yugoslavia demonstrates how fruitful this approach can be. Jakovljevic considers the concept of theatricality as central to understanding the events that took place in Yugoslavia. He examines the country?s trials, state ceremonies and festivals, army maneuvers, propaganda, and pop culture as ?rehearsals and temporary enactments of an ideologically formulated future.? His first chapter reveals the surrealist, avant-garde origins of key members of the Yugoslav bureaucracy after WWII, suggesting that those connections helped the culture of socialist Yugoslavia become a performance-centered culture.