Drawing from theatre, English studies, and art history, among others, these essays discuss the challenges and rewards of teaching medieval and early modern texts in the 21st-century university. Topics range from the intersections of race, religion, gender, and nation in cross-cultural encounters to the use of popular culture as pedagogical tools. "In this volume, Attar and Shutters have given us an invaluable and remarkably rich resource for the teaching and study of cross-cultural encounter in the medieval and early modern worlds. As the global premodern asserts itself increasingly in scholarship and the classroom, this book will provide an indispensable starting point for those seeking to broaden and challenge their views of transcultural contact and transmission. A stellar collection." - Bruce Holsinger, Professor of English, University of Virginia, USA, and author of Neomedievalism, Neoconservatism, and the War on Terror "The past is not what it used to be: a diverse, roiled, polyglot, globalized, culturally hybrid, and perpetually contested expanse unfolds where the simple origins of Europe used to be. The great strength of this well written, beautifully conceived volume is its emphasis on how to bring this temporally thick, cross-cultural past into the classroom. An exemplary work of pedagogy in action, this book should be read by anyone who cares about how the medieval and early modern periods are taught." - Jeffrey J. Cohen, Professor of English, George Washington University, USA and author of Stone: An Ecology of the Inhuman (forthcoming) "This timely and innovative collection makes a strong argument for the relevance of the humanities' traditional core - the study of medieval and early modern literature and culture - as transformed and transmitted in the globalized classrooms of the twenty-first century. Rigorously and relevantly attending to a diverse range of texts, theories, and practices for teaching cross-cultural and -temporal encounters, its twelve original essays constitute an important intervention into critical, pedagogical, and policy debates across a range of disciplines and institutions. This collection is bound to become an indispensable resource for researchers, teachers, and students of medieval and early modern studies, as well as pedagogical, performance, and postcolonial studies more broadly." - Bernadette Andrea, Professor of English, University of Texas at San Antonio, USA "This well-researched and timely collection encourages scholars, teachers, and students to reconsider the medieval and early modern worlds as multicultural, global, and culturally diverse milieux. Perhaps most excitingly, the collection also traces the paths of cultural appropriations historically and in particular political or imperial contexts. Its impressive range stretches from folk-tale to digital artefacts and its readings are 'presentist' in the best sense of that word." - Sujata Iyengar, Professor of English, University of Georgia, USA and author of Shades of Difference: Mythologies of Skin-Color in Early Modern England and Shakespeare's Medical Language, Co-editor and co-founder of Borrowers and Lenders: The Journal of Shakespeare and Appropriation.
|