CFP: Disability and Shakespearean Theatre Symposium

12th November 2015

Sir Alwyn Williams Building, Lilybank Gardens

University of Glasgow, G12 8QQ

9.45am-5pm, Wednesday 20^th April 2016

Attendance: £25 full, £15 concession, free for BSA members

This symposium draws together growing research interest in disability studies and Shakespearean theatre. In discussing the depiction, treatment, and uses of disability in Shakespeare’s work (and that of his contemporaries) alongside analysis of the role of disability in staging of his plays, we hope to encourage interaction between creative practitioners, historians, and literary scholars. Playwright and disability studies scholar Prof. Chris Mounsey (University of Winchester) will give the keynote address on “VariAbility in Shakespeare”, in which he will explore alternative ways of responding to the question of the existence of disability in the Early Modern period, and to one of Shakespeare’s most infamous characters: Richard III. Following the symposium, Glasgow-based playwright Molly Ziegler (Notes, Getting it (Back)) has agreed to premier her new play, Let Her Come In. Let Her Come In is a one act rewriting of Hamlet, focused on mental illness, gender, and disability.

We are now looking for academics, actors, and creative practitioners of all levels, periods, and fields to submit proposals for 20 minute conference papers, or 5-10 minute position papers for discussion. We invite papers on topics that include (but are not limited to):

• Disability in contemporary adaptations of Shakespeare
• 21^st-century understanding of (and challenges to) disability on the Shakespearean stage
• VariAbility and categorisations of disability on stage (especially as applied to mental and physical disabilities)
• Staging disability (actors, prostheses, costumes, etc.)
• Disabled actors and staging Shakespeare
• Signed Shakespeare, captioning, and assistive technologies
• Disabled scholars’ experience of Shakespeare in performance and the academy
• Cultural and historical concepts of disability in Shakespearean texts
• The language of disability in Shakespeare
• Challenging the idea of Shakespeare as savant
• Disability and Shakespeare’s collaborators and contemporaries
• Disability studies theory and Shakespearean theatre

Please email an abstract of up to 300 words and a short bio to the symposium organisers (disabilityandshakespeare@gmail.com) by Friday 15^th January 2016. Please indicate if your proposal is for a position paper. There are two small travel bursaries available for postgraduate/early career presenters; the recipients of these grants will be asked to write a short reflection on the symposium, which will be published on the BSA website, the Glasgow Medical Humanities Research Centre blog, and the symposium website.

 If you wish to be considered for one of the postgraduate bursaries, please email us for an application form and submit it with your abstract and bio. We will contact all respondents on the outcome of their proposal by Friday 22^nd January 2016. Thanks to funding from the British Shakespeare Association, this symposium will be free to attend for BSA members. Symposium attendees are welcome to join the BSA in advance of the event or on the day.

The symposium venue, the Sir Alwyn Williams Building, is fully accessible, and the symposium will include accommodations such as pre-circulated papers and discussion topics, ending with an interactive roundtable discussion. For more information on access, transport, and the venue please visit our website. If you have any questions, please email the symposium team at disabilityandshakespeare@gmail.com, or contact us via @Disability&SS.

British Shakespeare Association Teaching Trustee

30th October 2015

The Board of Trustees of the British Shakespeare Association wishes to co-opt a new Trustee from the teaching profession. We are looking for a member of the BSA who is willing to give of his or her time to further the aims of the BSA with particular attention to members of the teaching profession and their pupils. The Trustee would undertake to

• attend three meetings of the Board of Trustees per year and the Association’s AGM
• sit on the Board’s Education Sub-Committee (which normally converses virtually via email).

At these meetings and discussions, the Trustee will (1) inform the Board of the current interests and matters of concern amongst teachers and their pupils, including changes to the curriculum and assessment; (2) help in the planning of BSA events to meet the needs and interests of these groups; (3) help to develop strategies to engage teachers and their pupils in BSA events

We wish to appoint someone with

• a keen interest in developing enthusiasm for Shakespeare’s work amongst young people and teachers (essential)
• direct experience of teaching in either secondary or primary education (essential)
• an awareness of the national curriculum and recent changes therein (essential)
• knowledge of current assessment practices, e.g. working with primary assessment or examination boards as a teacher or an examiner (desirable)

The BSA will meet all reasonable expenses associated with attending meetings, which are normally held on a Saturday afternoon in Stratford-upon-Avon.

As a Trustee, you will share responsibility for helping the Board meet its charitable objectives. The BSA is a charitable company limited by guarantee and all Trustees share a responsibility to ensure that the BSA is managed well.

• For more information on the roles and responsibilities of a Trustee, please read the documents published by the Charity Commission here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/the-essential-trustee-what-you-need-to-know-cc3.
• To make sure you are eligible to become a Trustee, please check the criteria on the Charity Commission website: https://www.gov.uk/government/get-involved/take-part/help-run-a-charity

What are the benefits of joining the BSA Board?

You will gain

• opportunities for networking, mentoring and collaboration with scholars, practitioners and education professionals in Shakespeare studies.
• professional development through contributing to a non-profit charitable organisation.
• a wider perspective on Shakespeare and advance knowledge of Shakespeare-related events and research.
• the opportunity to steer the organisation to better meet the needs of teachers.

If you wish to nominate yourself for this role, please submit a 300 word (max) statement that outlines your interest in the role and your professional experience/affiliation by email to the BSA’s Deputy Chair, Alison Findlay a.g.findlay@lancaster.ac.uk, by the 30^th November 2015.

If you would like an informal chat about the role, please get in touch with Alison by email or speak to members of the Board at the Annual General Meeting on November 7^th.

MUSE OF FIRE Competition

9th October 2015

Members of the BSA are invited to participate in the following competition, a collaboration between the association and Illuminations.

WIN A LIMITED EDITION DVD OF MUSE OF FIRE SIGNED BY JUDI DENCH AND IAN MCKELLEN

“An epic road-trip buddy movie, that aims to dispel the fear and myths surrounding the most famous playwright in history. One dame, eight knights and two friends will change the way you feel about Shakespeare forever!”

This is the premise of the MUSE OF FIRE film, released on DVD on 6^th October.  Actors (and debut filmmakers) Giles Terera and Dan Poole embark on an exciting journey via Denmark, Hollywood, London’s Globe theatre, a prison in Berlin and Shakespeare’s home in Stratford-upon-Avon, to find out just what it is that makes us love – or loathe – the Bard. A host of Shakespearean stage luminaries including Ian McKellen, Judi Dench, Derek Jacobi, Mark Rylance, Tom Hiddleston, Baz Luhrmann, Jude Law, and Ewan McGregor speak openly about their early experiences, showing us how Shakespeare can be incredible fun.

You can watch a trailer of the film here:

MUSE OF FIRE- FILM TRAILER from Timebomb Pictures on Vimeo

Illuminations Media are kindly offering three prize packs to members of the BSA:

• a limited edition MUSE OF FIRE DVD, signed by Judi Dench and Ian McKellen
• a mix of Illuminations’ other DVDs, including a ‘normal’ MUSE OF FIRE DVD
• a mix of Nick Hern Books

Members of the BSA will have received an email with details on how to take part in the competition. If you have not received this message, please contact the membership secretary, Peter Kirwan (Peter.Kirwan@nottingham.ac.uk).

AGM and BSA Awards Ceremony

5th October 2015

Details of our AGM and annual award ceremony for new fellows of the British Shakespeare Association are now also available on the events part of this website

• AGM
• Awards Ceremony

British Shakespeare Association 

Honorary Fellowships 2015

The British Shakespeare association is delighted to announce the Award of Lifetime Honorary Fellowships to

Chris Grace

  And

Dame Janet Suzman

 The Award Ceremony will be held 3 – 5 PM on Saturday 7^th November at The Shakespeare Birthplace Trust, The Shakespeare Centre, Henley Street, Stratford upon Avon, CV37 6QW. Free for BSA members; £5 for non-members (deducted from cost if you join the bsa on the day) followed by pay-bar reception

Dame Janet Suzman will be interviewed by Professor Alison Findlay and Chris Grace will give a short address on the work of Shakespeare for Schools.

The Fellowships are awarded to persons who have made a major contribution to the furtherance of our understanding of the plays and poems of Shakespeare through their work in academic research, theatre or education.

Dame Janet Suzman is one of the most pioneering performers and directors of Shakespeare during the last 50 years. As an actor, she has infused her roles with powerful emotions provoking the audience into startlingly new appraisals of the play. Her achievements as a director have been extensive and had a major impact upon future productions; in particular, her path-breaking direction of the Market Theatre Othello (available on film) allowed audiences from around the globe to perceive how the play resonated with present-day politics. Moreover, Suzman has used her skills as both actor and director to produce books, such as Acting with Shakespeare and Not Hamlet, that have inspired a generation of  scholars, directors, actors, teachers and students.

Chris Grace has made Shakespeare live for young people. In 2000 he founded the Shakespeare Schools Festival, which is the largest youth drama festival in the UK and offers the opportunity for young people of all abilities and from all backgrounds to engage with Shakespeare. In addition, as Director of Animation at S4C, he created the hugely influential Shakespeare – The Animated Tales, ensuring that generations of children, inside and outside school, had their interest in Shakespeare sparked by the beauty and imagination of these pioneering broadcasts. Indeed, it remains the most popular programme on BBC Education. Above all, Grace’s work has been instrumental in inspiring, and continuing to inspire, teachers and young people.

Teaching Shakespeare 8 is out!

4th October 2015

I’m pleased to announce that the seventh issue of Teaching Shakespeare is now available for free download.

CLICK HERE TO READ THE PDF

Please note that in this issue we wrongly referred to Robert Sawyer  as an Assistant Professor. His position is, in fact, that of Professor.

You can read back issues of Teaching Shakespeare elsewhere on this website.

John Russell Brown

9th September 2015

The British Shakespeare Association is sad to announce that John Russell Brown passed away on 26th August. John was made an Honorary Fellow of the British Shakespeare Association last year in recognition of his exemplary contribution to British Shakespeare.

An eminent Shakespeare scholar and editor, John also established one of the country’s first university Drama departments at Birmingham and later ran the scripts department at the National Theatre. In addition to his academic and theatrical achievements, he helped bring Shakespeare to the wider public as a television presenter and children’s author. A full obituary is available in The Guardian.

Sidelights on Shakespeare: Peter Kirwan on Handling the Apocrypha

28th May 2015

To celebrity its 5th birthday, the Sidelights on Shakespeare project has invited one of its founder members (and BSA Trustee) Peter Kirwan to speak on Shakespeare’s apocrypha.

Details below, and on their poster.

To celebrate our 5^th birthday, we are delighted to welcome back one of the original founders of Sidelights on Shakespeare:

Dr Peter Kirwan, University of Nottingham

The Incomplete Works of William Shakespeare: Handling the Apocrypha

4pm, Tuesday 9^th June2015

Room 3 Wolfson Research Exchange Library, University of Warwick.

Birthday cake and wine to follow. All Welcome

Dr Kirwan will open up the key questions surrounding the so-called ‘Shakespeare Apocrypha’ in light of the most current developments in Shakespeare editorial practice. As new major ‘Complete Works’ projects seek to consolidate the constitution of the canon while other multi-volume series add ever more plays, what is at stake in editing and author-ising those plays whose authorship may never be resolved beyond doubt?

Peter Kirwan is Assistant Professor of Shakespeare & Early Modern Drama at the University of Nottingham. He is the author of Shakespeare and the Idea of Apocrypha (Cambridge, 2015) and co-editor of Shakespeare and the Digital World (Cambridge, 2014), as well as author of several articles and book chapters on Shakespeare’s print and performance history. He is Editions reviewer for Shakespeare Survey, Book Reviews Editor for Early Theatre and a trustee of the British Shakespeare Association. He is an award-winning teacher, and his current book project is a history of the theatre company Cheek by Jowl. He did his PhD at Warwick, where he was co-founder of ‘Sidelights on Shakespeare’.

@sidelights_on

http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/fac/arts/english/currentstudents/postgraduate/shakespeareresearchseminar

Sidelights on Shakespeare is sponsored by the Humanities Research Centre, University of Warwick

Sidelights on Shakespeare Event

24th February 2015

Members in the Coventry area may be interested by this forthcoming talk from one of our trustees, Sarah Olive, as part of the Sidelights on Shakespeare series at Warwick University.

‘Certain o’er incertainty’: eliding Troilus and Cressida’s ambiguity in the Lewis episode ‘Generation of Vipers’.

Monday 9th March at 4pm in the Library at Warwick University.

R.A. Foakes argues that Troilus and Cressida opens up contradictory perspectives. The play might then appear an unusual choice for appropriation in Lewis, a detective drama drawing on the traditions of Golden Age crime fiction: particularly given the genre’s need for ultimate certainty to conquer initial ambiguity and for multiple possible meanings to give way to a single, fixed interpretation of ‘whodunit’. Yet, in appropriating the play, the episode stakes its identity as part of a richly allusive series. This article considers the history of Shakespearean appropriation in one long-running UK television franchise and the dilemmas facing its 2015 season.

Teaching Shakespeare 7 is out!

29th January 2015

I’m pleased to announce that the seventh issue of Teaching Shakespeare, on policy, practice and pedagogy, is now available for free download.

CLICK HERE TO READ THE PDF

You can read back issues of Teaching Shakespeare elsewhere on this website.

Inspired by Shakespeare

9th January 2015

An exciting competition to celebrated the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare’s death is being run by UCLan publishing and the BSA Education Network.

Full details can be found on this PDF.

Inspired by Shakespeare: 1st January 2015 to 27th February 2015

UCLan Publishing has teamed up with the British Shakespeare Association Education Network to bring you an exciting opportunity. We are running a national competition in which you will be asked to submit creative pieces that will then go on to form the book, “Inspired by Shakespeare”. We aim to publish in 2016, marking the 400th anniversary of William Shakespeare’s death.

The competition is your chance to celebrate Shakespeare’s work in terms of how he has impacted art, literature, culture and YOU. Share your love for Shakespeare through submitting a creative piece, in the form of art or literature inspired by your favourite quote. The quote can be from either his plays, his sonnets or his life as long as it is personal to you. You will also be required to submit a short bio detailing your chosen quote and why this has inspired your creative piece.

Types of work that can be submitted:
1. 2D Visual art (paintings, photography, collage, word art)
2. Text-based work (a poem of up to 1000 words, or a short story between 1500 and 6000 words)

Our vision is to celebrate Shakespeare’s timelessness through inviting individuals from all walks of life to share their personal interpretation of his work.

Contact

Email: inspiredbyshakespeare@hotmail.com

Submission

Send your work and the application form to either the above email address or by post:
Inspired by Shakespeare,
UCLan Publishing,
Media Factory,
UCLan,
Kirkham Street,
Preston,
Lancashire PR1 2XY

All those selected will be notified after April 2015