Inclusive Pedagogy Resources

In the wake of the Black Lives Matter movement, the Committee on Diversity created the this anti-racist pedagogy resource list, if you would like to add additional sources to this list please contact the SAA at [email protected].

Early Modern Scholars of Colour

EMSOC aims to promote, support and foster anti-racism as well as intellectual and academic inclusivity in Shakespeare, Early Modern Studies and related disciplines in the UK and around the world. For more information or to become a member, please visit their website HERE.

Akhimie, Patricia, “Cultivating Expertise: Glossing Shakespeare and Race,” in “Race Before Race: Premodern Critical Race Studies,” ed. Ayanna Thompson, special issue Literature Compass 18.10 (2021), n.p.

Akhimie, Patricia, “Teaching Guide for ‘Cultivating Expertise’” in “Race Before Race: Premodern Critical Race Studies,” ed. Ayanna Thompson, special issue Literature Compass 18.10 (2021), 2 pp.

• Tracing connections between research methodologies and classroom practices in the study of Shakespeare and race, this essay argues for the importance of offering students’ opportunities to build and demonstrate expertise. The essay discusses the use of a glossary exercise in classes on race and early modern literature, and the learning objectives for such courses. Finally, the essay offers a critique of such courses as commonly structured and suggestions for new directions in teaching race in literature from this period.

Brown, David Sterling. “(Early) Modern Literature: Crossing the Color-Line.” The Radical Teacher: A Socialist, Feminist, Anti-Racist Journal on the Theory and Practice of Teaching no. 105, 2016.

• Brown discusses his experience creating and teaching a course “that aimed to shift the demographics of a traditional Shakespeare course by placing historically disparate texts and black and white authors in conversation with one another” (p. 70). Brown reports that reading early modern texts and modern texts by African American authors in tandem allowed students to gain insights and engage productively with the concept of race as it operated now and in the past.

Dadabhoy, Ambereen. “Skin in the Game: Teaching Race in Early Modern Literature.” Studies in Medieval and Renaissance Teaching.

• Dadabhoy discusses the consequences of addressing or not addressing race in the teaching of early modern literature and argues against treating race in Shakespeare as a topic found only in the “race plays.” Dadabhoy describes strategies for attuning students to constructions of race.

Demeter, Jason M. “African-American Shakespeares: Loving Blackness as Political Resistance.” Teaching Social Justice Through Shakespeare, edited by Hillary Eklund and Wendy Beth Hyman, Edinburgh U P, 2019, pp. 67–75.

• Demeter discusses the challenges which he has encountered and which other teachers must consider when trying to use Shakespeare for antiracist pedagogical ends.

Espinosa, Ruben. “Beyond The Tempest: Language, Legitimacy, and La Frontera.” The Shakespeare User: Critical and Creative Appropriations in a Networked Culture, edited by Valerie M. Fazel and Louise Geddes, Springer, 2017, pp. 41–61.

• From abstract: “…this chapter looks to the way that digital technologies and the YouTube venue allow Latinxs to use Shakespeare to explore and negotiate linguistic and ethnic difference while affording a novel and diverse view of Shakespeare for us all.”

Gillen, Katherine and Lisa Jennings. “Decolonizing Shakespeare?: Toward an Antiracist, Culturally Sustaining Practice.” The Sundial. November 26, 2019. https://medium.com/the-sundial-acmrs/decolonizing-shakespeare-toward-an-antiracist-culturally-sustaining-praxis-904cb9ff8a96

• Gillen and Jennings describe strategies they have used to do antiracist and decolonial pedagogy in the Shakespeare classroom.

Hall, Kim F. “Beauty and the Beast of Whiteness: Teaching Race and Gender.” Shakespeare Quarterly 47.4 (1996): 461-75.

• Hall argues for the importance of considering whiteness when working with race and early modern literature and proposes using a focus on beauty in early modern texts as an avenue for doing this work in the classroom.

—-. “‘Intelligently Organized Resistance’: Shakespeare in the Diasporic Politics of John E. Bruce.” Teaching Social Justice Through Shakespeare, edited by Hillary Eklund and Wendy Beth Hyman, Edinburgh U P, 2019, pp. 85–94.

• Hall draws lessons from the black writer and activist John E. Bruce to envision ways of engaging with Shakespeare without upholding white supremacism and settler colonialism. Specifically, Hall argues for attaching our loyalty to the communities we mean to serve, rather than to institutionalized ideas about Shakespeare and literature.

Metzger, Mary Janell. “Shakespearean Tragedy, Ethics, and Social Justice.” Teaching Social Justice Through Shakespeare: Why Renaissance Literature Matters Now, edited by Hillary Eklund and Wendy Beth Hyman, Edinburgh University Press, 2019, pp. 115–23, http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.3366/j.ctvrs912p.15.

• Metzger describes teaching Shakespeare’s tragedies with ethical philosophy to encourage students to think about topics including epistemic justice. In particular, Metzger discusses using this strategy with Othello to historicize racialization and examine systematized injustice.

Best, Michael. “Teaching Shakespeare to Judith: Gender Politics in Distance/Online Teaching.” Working Papers on the Web, vol. 4, no. Journal Article, 2002, https://internetshakespeare.uvic.ca/Annex/Articles/SAA2000/index.html.

• “This paper will look at the way that online components of two semester courses on Shakespeare allow both male and female students to examine gender issues in Shakespeare’s plays, with less direction from the instructor, and a corresponding freedom in their exploration of the text and of questions of gender politics.” (n.p.)

Bruckner, Lynne. “Reprocentric Ecologies: Pedagogy, Husbandry and A Midsummer Night’s Dream.” Ecological Approaches to Early Modern English Texts, Routledge, 2016.

• Bruckner discusses teaching A Midsummer Night’s Dream from an ecofeminist standpoint.

Kemp, Theresa D. “The Family is a Little Commonwealth: Teaching Mariam and Othello in a Special-Topics Course on Domestic England.” Shakespeare Quarterly, vol. 47, no. 4, 1996, pp. 451-460.

• Kemp discusses shedding light on issues of women’s status and domestic conflict by teaching Othello and The Tragedy of Mariam

Laroche, Rebecca, and Jennifer Munroe. “Teaching Environmental Justice and Early Modern Texts: Collaboration and Connected Classrooms.” Teaching Social Justice Through Shakespeare: Why Renaissance Literature Matters Now, edited by Hillary Eklund and Wendy Beth Hyman, Edinburgh University Press, 2019, pp. 124–33, http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.3366/j.ctvrs912p.16.

• The authors discuss teaching early modern texts with emphases on collaborative scholarship and ecofeminism.

Matchinske, Megan. “Credible Consorts: What Happens when Shakespeare’s Sisters Enter the Syllabus?” Shakespeare Quarterly, vol. 47, no. 4, 1996, pp. 433-50.

• Matchinske writes on how and why to include woman-authored early modern plays in the syllabus of a Shakespeare course.

Butcher, Jeffrey. “‘Leftward, Ho!’: Shakespeare and Lenin in the Tempest of Class Politics.” The Arden Handbook of Shakespeare and Social Justice, edited by David Ruiter, Bloomsbury, 2021, pp. 265–79.

• Butcher argues that the inclusion of Marxist and working-class critical perspectives is necessary in order for social justice-focused Shakespeare work to make meaningful change.

Windholz, Jordan. “Not Something, Not Nothing, Not Shakespeare: Digitized Playbooks and the Question of Access in the Undergraduate Literature Classroom.” Humanities, vol. 8, no. 2, 2019, p. 61, https://doi.org/10.3390/h8020061.

• Windholz discusses strategies for teaching early modern drama to students who may be disadvantaged in the digital divide.

O’Dair, Sharon, and Timothy Francisco, editors. Shakespeare and the 99%: Literary Studies, the Profession, and the Production of Inequity. Palgrave Macmillan, 2019.

• From publisher’s description: “Acknowledging the problematic relationship of higher education to the production of inequity and hierarchy in our society, essays in this book examine the profession, our pedagogy, and our scholarship in an effort to direct Shakespeare studies, literary studies, and higher education itself toward greater equity for students and professors.”

Hobgood, Allison P., and David Houston Wood. “Coda: Shakespearean Disability Pedagogy.” Recovering Disability in Early Modern England, edited by Allison P. Hobgood and David Houston Wood, Ohio State U P, 2020, pp. 187-92.

• This closing chapter in Recovering Disability in Early Modern England describes “the trajectory of a course, ‘Shakespeare and Disability,’ that Allison Hobgood offered while teaching at Spelman College, a historically Black women’s institution in Atlanta, Georgia. The goal of the course, as Hobgood explained it to her undergraduates, was threefold: to introduce disability studies as a critical approach, to imagine how contemporary disability theory might shape readings of Renaissance literature, and to uncover new disability histories in the early modern period” (p. 187).

Butler, Todd, and Ashley Boyd. “Cultivating Critical Content Knowledge: Early Modern Literature, Pre-Service Teachers, and New Methodologies for Social Justice.” Teaching Social Justice Through Shakespeare: Why Renaissance Literature Matters Now, edited by Hillary Eklund and Wendy Beth Hyman, Edinburgh University Press, 2019, pp. 225–34, http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.3366/j.ctvrs912p.26.

• Butler and Boyd discuss early modern literature and social justice in the context of teaching students preparing to teach in secondary schools.

De Barros, Eric L. “‘“Shakespeare” on His Lips’: Dreaming of the Shakespeare Center for Radical Thought and Transformative Action.” Teaching Social Justice Through Shakespeare: Why Renaissance Literature Matters Now, edited by Hillary Eklund and Wendy Beth Hyman, Edinburgh University Press, 2019, pp. 206–14, http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.3366/j.ctvrs912p.24.

• De Barros discusses using the complexity of Shakespeare’s language to encourage students to think critically about social justice issues related to the text.

Della Gatta, Carla. “Confronting Bias and Identifying Facts: Teaching Resistance Through Shakespeare.” Teaching Social Justice Through Shakespeare: Why Renaissance Literature Matters Now, edited by Hillary Eklund and Wendy Beth Hyman, Edinburgh University Press, 2019, pp. 165–73, http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.3366/j.ctvrs912p.20.

• The author “present[s] a pedagogy that engages Shakespeare plays as key tools for teaching students how to recognize evidence that confuses facts, feelings, and opinions” (p. 165).

Desai, Adhaar Noor. “Topical Shakespeare and the Urgency of Ambiguity.” Teaching Social Justice Through Shakespeare: Why Renaissance Literature Matters Now, edited by Hillary Eklund and Wendy Beth Hyman, Edinburgh University Press, 2019, pp. 27–35, http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.3366/j.ctvrs912p.6.

• Desai discusses teaching Shakespeare in a way that encourages engagement with social issues, rather than valorizing Shakespeare or his works.

Eklund, Hillary and Wendy Beth Hyman, editors. Teaching Social Justice Through Shakespeare: Why Renaissance Literature Matters Now. Edinburgh U P, 2019.

• This anthology considers various dimensions of social justice and their intersections.

Harrison, Matthew. “Adjunct Pleasure: Shakespeare’s Sonnets and the Writing on the Walls.” Teaching Social Justice Through Shakespeare: Why Renaissance Literature Matters Now, edited by Hillary Eklund and Wendy Beth Hyman, Edinburgh University Press, 2019, pp. 155–64, http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.3366/j.ctvrs912p.19.

• Harrison discusses methods for teaching Elizabethan sonnets that “invite students to take ownership over the physical space of the classroom, to replace postures designed for obedience with active and bodily engagement with each other’s ideas” (p. 162).

Hyman, Wendy Beth shares syllabi for teaching social justice in Shakespeare:

• Shakespearean Comedy and Social Justice syllabus
• Shakespeare & Metamorphosis syllabus

Philippian, Mardy, Sonya Freeman Loftis, and Justin P. Shaw, eds. Inclusive Shakespeares: Identity, Pedagogy, Performance. Palgrave, 2023.

• This volume responds to the growing concern to make Shakespeare Studies inclusive of prospective students, teachers, performers, and audiences who have occupied a historically marginalized position in relation to Shakespeare’s poetry and plays. This timely collection includes essays by leading and emerging scholarly voices concerned to open interest and participation in Shakespeare to wider appreciation and use. The essays discuss topics ranging from ethically-informed pedagogy to discussions of public partnerships, from accessible theater for people with disabilities to the use of Shakespeare in technical and community colleges. Inclusive Shakespeares contributes to national conversations about the role of literature in the larger project of inclusion, using Shakespeare Studies as the medium to critically examine interactions between personal identity and academia at large.

Ryan, Kiernan. “The Empathetic Imagination and the Dream of Equality: Shakespeare’s ‘Poetical Justice.’” The Arden Handbook of Shakespeare and Social Justice, edited by David Ruiter, Bloomsbury, 2021, pp. 235–50.

• Ryan writes that Shakespeare used imagination to recognize and imagine redresses for social injustice in his world, and that we can draw on his works to do likewise in our own, not-so-different world.

Ruiter, David, editor. The Arden Research Handbook of Shakespeare and Social Justice. Bloomsbury Academic, 2020.

• This anthology provides content helpful to teachers (as well as researchers, directors, actors, and others) regarding Shakespeare and various aspects of social justice.

Thompson, Ayanna, and Laura B. Turchi. “Active Shakespeare: A Social Justice Framework.” The Arden Handbook of Shakespeare and Social Justice, edited by David Ruiter, Bloomsbury, 2021, pp. 47–59.

• Rejecting the teaching of Shakespeare as universal, Thompson and Turchi argue that Shakespeare should be taught in the context of social justice so as to remain relevant to students and the particulars of their own real lives.

—-. Teaching Shakespeare with Purpose: A Student-Centered Approach. Bloomsbury, 2016.

• Thompson and Turchi focus on Shakespeare pedagogy that rejects notions of universality and instead works toward more just teaching and learning.

Walker, Jessica. “Appropriating Shakespeare for Marginalized Students.” The Routledge Handbook to Shakespeare and Global Appropriation, edited by Christy Desmet et al., Routledge, 2020, pp. 206–16.

• Walker argues that teachers can appropriate Shakespeare for the use and benefit of students from marginalized groups by centering the experiences of those students.