Recently there have been many discussions about decolonizing the curriculum. What does this mean for the teaching of Shakespeare? As Gauri Viswanathan explored in her groundbreaking book Masks of Conquest, Shakespeare’s place in the English literary curriculum was at its heart a colonial endeavor. Does this history mean that we should eschew teaching Shakespeare’s plays? Does this mean that a decolonized approach to the curriculum would disallow the inclusion of Shakespeare? No. As many LGBTQ scholars and activists have been teaching us lately: we have been brainwashed into binary thinking. We have been taught to view things in binary terms: either/or. This webinar will explore what decolonized thinking and teaching entails.
