Shakespeare at Notre Dame is pleased to announce the Shakespeare in
Prisons Conference hosted by the University of Notre Dame on Friday,
November 15, and Saturday, November 16, 2013.
Featuring keynote addresses and film screenings by Curt Tofteland
(founding director of Shakespeare Behind Bars) and Tom Magill (founder
of the Educational Shakespeare Center and director of the Irish film
Mickey B ), the conference aims to bring together artists and educators
engaged in transformational arts programs using Shakespeare in prisons
across the USA (and the world) for an exploration and study of the
effects such programming has on prison populations. The goal is to
promote a collaborative learning forum where participants will be
exposed to a diverse array of programs that all strive for a common
result: the habilitation of the inmate’s mind, heart, body, and spirit.
Departing from the traditional academic conference structure, the
Shakespeare in Prisons conference will focus on the craft and
experiences of the practitioner—while allowing ample time for
one-on-one networking and collaboration.
In addition to the keynotes and film screenings (and Q&A’s),
attendees are invited to participate in workshops that explore
innovative methodologies, as well as panel discussions that are designed
to stimulate discussion about practitioner experiences and best
practices within the industrial prison complex.
Registration is $25 and includes a dinner/reception on Friday night,
lunch and dinner on Saturday, and admission to all workshops and film
screenings. Online registration begins on Monday, June 10 via www.conferences.nd.edu
. More information regarding the conference schedule, lodging
information, and the availability of a limited number of bursaries to
help with attendee expenses will be made available on June 10. In the
meantime, please contact Scott Jackson at scottjackson@nd.edu for
more information.
We hope that you will join us for this unique gathering of like-minded individuals.
All the very best–
Scott Jackson, Peter Holland, and Curt Tofteland
About the speakers and host:
Curt L. Tofteland is the founder of the internationally acclaimed
Shakespeare Behind Bars (SBB) program. SBB has twelve programs in
Kentucky and Michigan. He currently facilitates the adult Shakespeare
Behind Bars/Michigan program at the Earnest C. Brooks Correctional
Facility in Muskegon Heights and SBB’s first co-gender, court-ordered,
juvenile Shakespeare Behind/Beyond Bars programs at the Ottawa County
Juvenile Detention Center and the Juvenile Justice Institute. From
1995-2008, he facilitated the SBB/KY program at the Luther Luckett
Correctional Complex, producing and directing fourteen Shakespeare
productions. His 2003 SBB/KY production of The Tempest was chronicled
by Philomath Films, producing the documentary Shakespeare Behind Bars ,
which premiered at the 2005 Sundance Film Festival and went on to be
screened at 40+ film festivals worldwide, winning eleven awards. He is a
national and international speaker, having lectured at over forty
colleges and universities across the United States and at TEDx Berkeley,
TEDxEast (NYC), and TEDx Macatowa. For his work as a Prison Arts
Practitioner he was awarded fellowships from the Fulbright and Petra
Foundations, as well as a Doctorate of Humane Letters from Bellarmine
University. He is a founding member and past president of the
Shakespeare Theatre Association, an international service organization
for theatres that produce the works of William Shakespeare. He is a
published essayist and poet, currently authoring the book, Behind the
Bard-Wire: Reflection, Responsibility, Redemption, & Forgiveness…The
Transformative Power of Art, Theatre, and Shakespeare. From 1989-2008,
he served as producing artistic director of the Kentucky Shakespeare
Festival, producing fifty Shakespeare productions, directing
twenty-five, and acting in eight. A trailer for Shakespeare Behind Bars
can be viewed at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S2kr5wV_AiQ More information on Curt’s work can be found at http://www.shakespearebehindbars.org/
Tom Magill is an ex-prisoner who transformed his life through arts
education while in prison for violence. While incarcerated he met his
enemy—and his enemy became his teacher. On release he earned a B.A.
(Hons) in Drama and Theatre Studies at the University of Birmingham and
an M.A. in Cultural Studies at the University of Leeds. He is an
award-winning filmmaker, drama facilitator, actor, writer, director, and
producer. He specializes in utilizing Augusto Boal’s “Theatre of the
Oppressed” methodology and the works of William Shakespeare in
transforming community and prison settings. After training with Michael
Bogdanov, he became his and Augusto Boal’s personal representative
in Northern Ireland. In 1999 he founded the Educational Shakespeare
Company (ESC) to develop drama and film with prisoners and ex-prisoners.
ESC is an award-winning arts education charity, empowering marginalized
people to find their voice and tell their stories through film. In 2007
he directed Mickey B , an award-winning feature film adaptation of
Shakespeare’s Macbeth cast with prisoners from
Maghaberry maximum-security prison. For his film direction he has
received the 2011 Justice in the Community Award (from the Northern
Ireland Department of Justice), the 2008 Roger Graef Award for
Outstanding Achievement in Film at the Koestler Awards (for Mickey B ),
the Arthur Koestler Award for Prison Drama in 2004 and 2006 (for Inside
Job and The Big Question , respectively), and the Impetus Human Rights
Award in 2005, 2006, and 2007 (for Bridging the Divide ). He has
presented his film work in Britain, Canada, Denmark, Germany, Holland,
Ireland, Israel, Nigeria, South Korea, and the United States. More
information on Tom’s work can be found at http://esc-film.com/ A trailer of Mickey B can be viewed at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oFKMIswx5VY
Peter
Holland holds the McMeel Family Chair in Shakespeare Studies and is
the Associate Dean for the Arts at the University of Notre Dame. He is
one of the central figures in performance-oriented Shakespeare
criticism, served as Director of the Shakespeare Institute at
Stratford-upon-Avon before coming to Notre Dame in 2002. He is editor of
Shakespeare Survey as well as a number of other series. Among his
books are English Shakespeares: Shakespeare on the English Stage in the
1990s and a major study of Restoration drama The Ornament of Action .
He has also edited many Shakespeare plays, including A Midsummer Night’s
Dream for the Oxford Shakespeare series. In 2007, he completed
publication of a five volume series of collections of essays entitled
Rethinking British Theatre History . In 2007-08, he served as President
of the Shakespeare Association of America. He was elected an honorary
fellow at Trinity Hall, his alma mater and one of the 31 colleges that
comprise the University of Cambridge. His Arden edition of Coriolanus
was released in early 2013.
Shakespeare at Notre Dame is a program that recognizes the
centrality of the study of Shakespeare in humanistic pedagogy at the
University of Notre Dame. The creation of the “Shakespeare Initiative”
in 2001 sought to broaden the Shakespeare offerings on campus and
establish the permanence of this new tradition for an audience of
students, faculty, the South Bend community at-large, and a national
and international audience. To that end, the current programs and future
prospects that comprise Shakespeare at Notre Dame have created a
regional center for Shakespearean scholarship, production, educational
outreach, and academic research by enmeshing programs as far-reaching
and diverse as Actors From The London Stage, the Notre Dame Shakespeare
Festival, visiting guest artists and lecturers, touring productions, and
new media library collections; ensuring Notre Dame’s status as a
nationally visible—and the Midwest’s pre-eminent—venue for Shakespeare
Studies. Find out more at http://shakespeare.nd.edu/
No comments:
Post a Comment