The Arts Britain still Ignores?

Abstract

This Note offers a provocation surrounding questions of diversity in British theatre today. It is now 40 years since the publication of Naseem Khan’s seminal report The Arts Britain Ignores which charted the range of arts practices amongst ethnic minority communities that were invisible and unsupported by national institutions. How much has changed since then? Looking at issues of funding policies, the make-up of boards of arts institutions, publishing and casting opportunities, this Note will ask if the current state of ‘British theatre’ represents what it means to be British in the twenty-first century.