Shakespeare Studies
Birkbeck has a lively research community working and discussing Shakespeare – both the texts and contemporary performances - as well as offering undergraduate and MA courses which allow students to subject in more depth.
Activities and events
Department experts
- Michael Dobson: Michael Dobson, Professor of Shakespeare Studies, has worked extensively in universities in Britain and the United States, and has held visiting fellowships in the US and in China. He comments regularly on Shakespearean performance and criticism for the London Review of Books and the BBC, and has contributed programme notes for the RSC, Peter Stein, the Sheffield Crucible, and Shakespeare’s Globe. As well as pursuing interests in textual, historical and biographical matters, his work on Shakespeare is particularly concerned with the stage and critical history of the canon from the Renaissance to the present.
- Aoife Monks: Aoife Monks specialises in theatre and performance studies. Her research includes: costume, fashion and materiality in the theatre; the histories and cultures of cross-dressing; the work of contemporary female theatre directors; emigration and tourism in the performance of Irishness; oratory and theatricality; contemporary uses of Shakespeare in performance, death, ghosts and objects in performance; and Naturalism. She publishes and works through practice as research, and as a volunteer and researcher for the theatre charity Scene and Heard. Her monograph 'The Actor in Costume' is forthcoming with Palgrave Macmillan. She has published extensively on the work of the theatre director Deborah Warner, the theatre company Wooster Group, gender and performance, and Riverdance and St Patrick's Day.
Relevant courses
- BA Arts and Humanities
- BA English
- BA Theatre Studies and English / BA Theatre Studies and Humanities
- MA Shakespeare and Contemporary Performance
- MPhil/PhD degrees: you can expect world-class supervision from our departmental experts.
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