Distancing effect

Set design for a production of Brecht's Mother Courage and Her Children, featuring a large scene-setting caption Polen ("Poland") above the stage

The distancing effect, also translated as alienation effect (German: Verfremdungseffekt or V-Effekt), is a concept in performing arts credited to German playwright Bertolt Brecht.

Brecht first used the term in his essay "Alienation Effects in Chinese Acting" published in 1936, in which he described it as performing "in such a way that the audience was hindered from simply identifying itself with the characters in the play. Acceptance or rejection of their actions and utterances was meant to take place on a conscious plane, instead of, as hitherto, in the audience's subconscious".[1]

  1. ^ John Willett, ed. and trans., Brecht on Theatre (New York: Hill and Wang, 1964), p. 91.