Teaching Shakespeare in Tempestuous Times by Craig Dionne

Teaching Shakespeare in Tempestuous Times by Craig Dionne

This book addresses the profound crisis facing professors of Shakespeare in non-elite and regional public universities in the US, providing a set of bold solutions to these problems.

The study of Shakespeare, once considered untouchable, now struggles in an era where higher education is too expensive and too politicized. An enrolment drop is only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to decades of neoliberal institutional management and public financial disinvestment, resulting in widespread structural cuts, department consolidation and the elimination of specialized curricula. How do professors cope aboard what feels like a sinking ship?

Rather than stick to what is familiar, this book offers 9 essays characterized by ‘Titanic optimism’, emphasizing both pragmatic survival and pedagogical reinvention. From case studies of thriving new applied humanities programs to guerrilla tactics of embedding Shakespeare within generalist courses, these strategies offer performance-based, joy-centred learning to cultivate essential 21st-century skills, providing activities that counter the use of AI. They explore more creative forms of scholarship that embrace uncertainty and pedagogical approaches that resist programmatic models in order to build communities and underscore the arts’ cultural value for diverse student populations. Relevant not only to Shakespeareans but the humanities more broadly, this book is a vital guide for any faculty seeking to adapt their praxis, resist the market takeover of education and ensure the enduring importance of critical humanistic inquiry.

Craig Dionne is Professor of English at Eastern Michigan University, USA. He is author of Posthuman Lear: Reading Shakespeare in the Anthropocene (2016) and has co-edited several anthologies including Bollywood Shakespeares (2014), Native Shakespeares: Indigenous Appropriations on a Global Stage (2008), Rogues and Early Modern English Culture (2005), and Disciplining English (2002) with David Shumway.
Timothy Francisco is Professor of English and Director for the Center for Working Class Studies at Youngstown State University, USA. He co-edited with Sharon O'Dair Shakespeare and the 99 %: Literary Studies, The Profession and The Production of Inequity (2019), co-wrote “Whither Goest Thou Public Shakespearian” lead essay for Shakespeare Survey’s special issue on Education, (2021,) and co-edited a special issue of Shakespeare Bulletin on “Public Shakespeare and Performance” (2023).
Sharon O’Dair is Professor Emerita of English and was the former director of the Hudson Strode Program in Renaissance Studies at the University of Alabama, USA. In addition to her recent collaborations with Francisco, she is author of Class, Critics, and Shakespeare: Bottom Lines on the Culture Wars (2000) and co-edited The Production of English Renaissance Culture (1994).