|
.
|
The creation and perpetuation of cultural myths is linked to
the powerful ways they are promoted by educational
institutions. As a consequence, the study of Shakespeare's
appropriation by European culture cannot be full and
comprehensive without the study of the dissemination,
through the channels of education, of images and meanings,
which are of surprising permanence. The heated debate in
Britain, concerning Shakespeare's place in the National
Curriculum during the late 1980s and 1990s, which sparked a
major controversy and highlighted a number of problems,
ranging from the methodology to the ideology of teaching, is
only a recent example of the importance of educational
issues.
Shakespeare's place in European education has long been
secure and though publications on aspects of it are not
rare, there has not been a serious recent effort to study
the role of education in creating Shakespeare as a cultural
icon.
The papers are dealing with:
|
-
|
Shakespeare
in national systems of education
|
|
-
|
The
persistence of interpretational models/continuity
of received ideas
|
|
-
|
Ideologies
and their effect on Shakespeare's place in
education
|
|
-
|
Shakespeare's
role, if any, in the creation of local or
supra-national cultural identities
|
|
-
|
Children's
editions of Shakespeare's plays and the ways they
are used to create models and values
|
|
-
|
The
influence of film on education
|
|
-
|
Topics
related to the wider appreciation of the impact of
education on Shakespeare as a cultural sign of
European importance
|
|
|
.
|
papers:
Joanna Montgomery Byles (University of Cyprus, Lefkosia,
Greece): "Shakespeare and Theatres of War" abstract
/ paper
Carla Dente (University of Pisa, Italy): "Studying the
reception of Shakespeare's Hamlet in the theatre: a
hypertext of nineteenth-century promptbooks as teaching
material" abstract
/ paper
Renate Haas (Kiel University, Germany): "The
'Ruhrfestspiele': European Shakespeare &endash; Industrial
and Post-Industrial" abstract
/ paper
Refik Kadija (Tirana University, Albania): "The Role Of
Education In Creating A Shakespeare Cultural Icon In
Albania" abstract
/ paper
Ishrat Lindblad (Uppsala University, Stockholm, Sweden)
"'In the
Company of Shakespeare' - a cultural and educational project
in Stockholm" abstract
/ paper
abstracts:
Joanna Montgomery Byles (University of
Cyprus, Lefkosia, Greece)
Shakespeare and Theatres of War
Why is it that Troilus and Cressida has become the
anti-war play for our times? After all Shakespeare wrote
other plays about war, such as the HenryVI triology
dramatizing the so-called Wars of the Roses in England in
the 14th century, in which there is a particularly harrowing
scene of civil war where a father unknowingly kills his son,
and a son his father, and then there is the vastly popular
Henry V dramatizing the English victory at Agincourt.
Yet, starting with William Poel's 1903 production it is
Troilus and Cressida that holds the stage in the
twentieth century, especially after World War Two.
As I hope my paper will suggest, the answer lies in our
changed and changing attitudes to war, to the military and
to militarism; our healthy suspicion of heroes, our distaste
for any glamour or glory associated with battle, and our
general and collective sense of guilt for the atrocious
military history of our own century. Dept. of Foreign
Languages and Literatures, University of Cyprus, Lefkosia,
Eastern Mediterranean.
Carla Dente (University of Pisa, Italy)
Studying the reception of Shakespeare's Hamlet in
the theatre: a hypertext of nineteenth-century promptbooks
as teaching material
The paper is an opportunity to reflect critically on the
production and use of an hypertext made of those promptbooks
that are considered as landmarks for the transmission of
Hamlet text in the theatre in the nineteenth
century.
This structured archive has been produced with the help of
the students and used for teaching within the 2000-01 course
of History of English Theatre and Drama. It has been planned
to make it available on line for departemental use.
The paper will deal with the inclusion of G.B. in a
discourse on the circulation of Shakespeare's texts as
theatre icons in 19th -cent. Europe.
Renate Haas (Kiel University, Germany)
The "Ruhrfestspiele": European Shakespeare &endash;
Industrial and Post-Industrial
The "Europäisches Festival Ruhrfestspiele
Recklinghausen" holds a prominent position within Germany
and, awarded the title of "Kulturbühne Europas" by the
European Commission, it even claims to be the
political festival of the continent. It arose out of "coal
for art, art for coal": guest performances of the great
Hamburg theatres in the summer of 1947 in return for
generous help with coal in the preceding severe winter. It
was instituted by the Confederation of Trade Unions and the
City of Recklinghausen in contradistinction to middle and
upper class tradition (Bayreuth, Salzburg) and soon
attracted the broadest public support. Various other items
were added, among them "Europäische Gespräche" as
early as 1950.
Although the founding myth highlights the prototypical
industrial worker, the miner, the Ruhr Festival was, from
the start, aimed at the whole working population.
Established even prior to the two German States in one of
the world's largest single industrial regions, it widened
the access to culture and education many years before the
first local universities and thus contributed to a
development which has helped people to meet the challenge of
the "Second" and "Third Industrial Revolutions".
With unique clarity, the Ruhr Festival mirrors the course of
West Germany and, particularly, the concepts of culture and
education prevalent in a large and important sector of
society. It epitomizes factors which have characterized the
reconstruction of Germany and, beyond it, in varying
degrees, the postwar "New Europe": social cooperation, solid
expansion of education, and early European orientation.
Since 1949, Shakespeare has played a vital part in the Ruhr
Festival; second only to Brecht, during its first fifty
years. The paper will trace Shakespeare's role through the
various stages, with special emphasis on the last: from the
early phase when only the best was considered good enough
for the workers; via narrow, ideological TU concepts of
culture, from the late 60s onwards; to the emphatic European
orientation under Hansgünther Heyme.
Refik Kadija (Tirana University,
Albania)
The Role Of Education In Creating A Shakespeare Cultural
Icon In Albania
My paper will focus on the ideological and cultural
effects in the treatment of Shakespeare in Albanian
education before and after the fall of communism, i.e.
before and after 1990; the place of Shakespeare in the
Albanian national system of education; the influence of film
versions of Shakespeare's works (tragedies and comedies) in
creating Shakespeare icons in Albania; the relationship of
teaching, translation and performace of Shakespeare's works
and their role in cultivating Shakespeare icons in
Albania.
Ishrat Lindblad (Uppsala
University, Stockholm, Sweden)
"In
the Company of Shakespeare" - a cultural and educational
project in Stockholm
The aim of this paper is to present and discuss a unique
long-term project to introduce Shakespeare in English to
Swedish schoolchildren that began tentatively under the
leadership of the director and choreographer, Donya Feuer in
September 1990, reached a climax in 1998 when Stockholm was
cultural capital of Europe, and continues at the present
time as a joint project between the Royal Dramatic Theatre
of Sweden (Dramaten), Kulturhuset in Stockholm
and the Teacher's Training College in Stockholm
(Lärarhögskolan).
paper
|