English

All the world’s a stage for William Shakespeare

Kylie Clarke — Wed, 26 Nov 2025 21:32:57 +0000

All the world’s a stage for William Shakespeare Kylie Clarke Wed, 11/26/2025 - 14:32

Alexandra Phelps

With the Nov. 26 cinematic release of Hamnet, CU Boulder scholars consider what we actually know about the famed playwright and why we’re still reading him four centuries later

Act One: Setting the scene

“Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears.” The legacy and legend of William Shakespeare has expanded well beyond the open-air theaters of Renaissance London. Embedded in classrooms, films and novels, his plays and poetry have become universally known and loved. Before he inspired generations of artists, however, he was inspired by the art around him. Adapting the stories and dramas he observed and experienced, his storytelling has entertained viewers and readers for four centuries.

However, his dramas are mostly what we have left of him.

“The wealth of beautiful and deep feeling poetry and drama that Shakespeare left, contrasted with the poverty of documents that give us a sense of who he is as a person, is very intriguing” explains Dianne Mitchell, a �� assistant professor of English and Renaissance literature scholar. This poverty has led scholars and writers, including bestselling author Maggie O’Farrell, to imagine what the lives of Shakespeare and his family may have been like.

In her 2020 novel Hamnet, a film adaptation of which will be released in theaters today (Nov. 26), O’Farrell weaves a plot following Shakespeare and his wife – referred to in the novel and film as Agnes – and their children, twins Judith and Hamnet and their older sister Susanna, creating a domestic view of their lives in Stratford. Based on the sparse information about Shakespeare available through legal documents, O’Farrell spins a fictional tale of loss, love and the family of one of the world’s most influential playwrights.

Meet the Shakespeare scholars

Scene One: Finding a love

Enter Dianne Mitchell, Katherine Eggert, Kevin Rich, Heidi Schmidt, & Amanda Giguere

At CU Boulder, Shakespeare’s work is integral both in English classrooms and on stages. Scholars of literature and theater, as well as organizers of the Colorado Shakespeare Festival (CSF), found a love for Shakespeare’s work which now guides their professional careers.

Katherine Eggert, a professor of English and vice chancellor and senior vice provost for academic planning and assessment, remembers, “I was going to study Victorian literature in graduate school, but then I took a class from Stephen Greenblatt, who is one of the world’s most famous Shakespeare scholars, and I knew that I could not leave the Renaissance behind.”

Eggert, drawing on her work on Renaissance epistemology – understanding how it is possible we know things and not others – and Renaissance history, explains, “We know a great deal about Shakespeare’s dealings in property, his legal involvements, we know whether he paid his taxes. We know the kinds of records that get kept in life. We do not have his diaries; we do not have his private remarks about what he thought about any given subject. What we do have is his literary work.”

For Dianne Mitchell, literary work and poetry of the Renaissance in particular spoke to her. “I had some great teachers when I was an undergraduate who really brought the 16th and 17th century literary world to life, especially poetry. I hadn’t realized how sensual and how deep the poetry felt.” Mitchell, among the other classes she teaches, developed an upper-level English course that is cross-listed with women and gender studies called Sex in Shakespeare’s Time. She reflects that students are “often surprised how up front both real women and imaginary women can be about what it is that they can and don’t desire.”

The stage is another way people find new ways to look at texts and themselves. For Kevin Rich, associate professor of theater and director of the Applied Shakespeare graduate certificate, theater offered him a place to conquer his fear of speaking. He remembers, “I was at a summer camp junior year of high school and they said do something that scares you, and I said acting scares me. I always wanted to be a teacher and once I found acting, I knew what I wanted to teach.”

Later, he saw a six-person production of Shakespeare’s As You Like It on a basketball court in New York City’s lower east side and “it was magical. It was awesome. Kids who were coming to play basketball saw that a play was happening and sat on their basketballs and watched it,” he recalls.

For Heidi Schmidt, a director and teacher with the Colorado Shakespeare Festival, it was the connections she made rather than the setting of a theater that drew her in. “I really liked theater people. When I started hanging around theater people there was this relief that I could just be more of myself than I was in the rest of my life.” Now involved in every aspect of the theater, she works alongside Rich and Amanda Giguere, CSF director of outreach, to develop the CSF school program.

Amanda Giguere found theater at a young age at a Shakespeare camp: “It planted the seed and now this is my life’s work.” When she was choosing a graduate school, “I applied to one school, CU Boulder, sight unseen … because of its connection to the Colorado Shakespeare Festival. Twenty-one years later, I’m still here.” Her book, Shakespeare & Violence Prevention: A Practical Handbook for Educators, allows teachers all over the country to use CSF’s teaching and practices in their classrooms.

In the five years since its publication and adaptation to film, the novel has grown a wider audience interested in imagining who Shakespeare could have been. Although scholars often try – to varying degrees of success – to explain Shakespeare the person, it is often novelists and playwrights like Shakespeare who bring him most to life. Through his plays, Shakespeare has touched audiences by interpreting the world he experienced through his writing.

Many �� Shakespeare scholars and Colorado Shakespeare Festival (CSF) drama researchers are excited for the film adaptation of Hamnet. This film offers another insight into what Shakespeare could have been, beyond the dramas he created.

Act Two: Teaching Shakespeare

Enter CU Boulder’s Dianne Mitchell, Katherine Eggert, Kevin Rich, Heidi Schmidt and Amanda Giguere

“Shakespeare’s plays can be a way to think through questions that students themselves are asking, and we don’t only need Shakespeare to help us answer these questions. But it’s funny how much he is wondering about some of the same issues many of my students are wondering about or exploring some of the same problems that beset them,” says Mitchell.

Part of Shakespeare’s brilliance is his ability to reach people at any age. Kevin Rich, an associate professor of Theatre at CU Boulder, remembers seeing “a 4-year-old perform a Cleopatra monologue (from Antony and Cleopatra). You would think that’s too hard, but at that age, they’re not afraid of words yet – all words are new. This language was not intimidating and she killed it. She was so brave and let the words be as big as they were. That’s when I realized no age is too young to be introduced to these plays, and you’ll always learn more as you get older.”

Eggert emphasizes the importance of reading the text aloud in English courses: “I do ask students to read in class. I think it’s really important to hear Shakespeare and to hear the language coming out of your mouth and not just as a professional. When you read Renaissance literature – not just Shakespeare – and literature of any kind aloud, you understand it in your ear, even if you don’t understand every word on the page.”

Act Three: Favorite plays

Everybody reads Shakespeare differently, allowing for individuals to connect with his works in different ways.

Schmidt, for example, recalls a time at a camp where she was directing Measure for Measure. The play is about a duke who lets the affairs of state slide and instead of handling them, claims he’s going on sabbatical. However, he doesn’t and sticks around in disguise, observing as people get manipulated by his deputy.

“I said, ‘OK, let’s just agree as a group that tricking someone into having sex with someone they don’t want to is bad. Period, the end,’” Schmidt says. “The youngest kid in the class, 13, puts her hand in the air and shouts, ‘Consent is sexy!’ It was one of my proudest teaching moments.”

Giguere recognizes the power in drawing connections between historical events and the situations Shakespeare portrays in his stories.” Tyrant by Stephen Greenblatt is about the tyrants in Shakespeare’s plays. I’m on the section on Richard III, and I’m thinking about how it shows what happens when hate is allowed to grow and fester. It’s crazy that Richard III became king, that’s sort of baffling.”

Rich sees great power in how Shakespeare can capture human conditions in social and emotional situations, recalling, “I’ve had an inmate say to me, ‘Shakespeare had to have done time,’ because he cannot have written the prison scene in Richard II without having spent time in a cell himself. I’ve had veterans say he had to have been in war, because he cannot have possibly written about war like he does without having experienced it. So, maybe that’s true or maybe he was just that empathetic, that able to imagine perspectives other than his own.”

Mitchell reflects, “I’ve started teaching one of Shakespeare’s late plays — by which I mean a play that he wrote at the end of his dramatic career — both at the undergraduate and graduate level. It’s a play called Cymbeline. One of the reasons [I like teaching it] is that students have no expectations about the play and its characters when they come into my class. I like teaching it because you really see a Shakespeare at the end of his career who is so confident in his dramatic abilities that he starts breaking all the rules. It’s really fun to watch him discard habits that he practices in some of his more canonical plays.”

Eggert finds that familiarity can generate new insights. She says, “The play I most like to teach, that’s Hamlet. It’s infinitely rich and even if students have already read it before, there is so much to discover on the second, third and 20th reading.” Whether a student is completely new to a play or reading it again, there are so many meaningful ways for them to interact with the text.

Act Four: Hamnet as a novel and a stage play

Giguere and Schmidt both saw the first stage adaptation of Hamnet at the Swan Theatre in Stratford-upon-Avon. Prior to seeing it, Giguere read the novel and was pleased that even though the novel takes a lot of liberties with who Shakespeare’s wife was, they are “beautiful liberties.”

O’Farrell’s novel, despite being about Shakespeare, leans more deeply into the lives of Agnes and his children than other novelists and scholars have. Often villainized in history, Agnes in the novel is shown in a new light. There is much speculation about the circumstances around her and William Shakespeare’s marriage, Eggert disputes some scholars’ insinuations that since she was older than he and was pregnant, she trapped him in a marriage that he didn’t want. This has led to a fictional narrative in which the two lived separate lives, and Shakespeare moved to London to escape her.

Eggert emphasizes that there is no evidence that supports this theory. In fact, she says, “just a few months ago, a scholar made a good case that a letter found in an old book that had been owned by an acquaintance of Shakespeare’s, used as part of the binding of this book, was written to Shakespeare’s wife, and the letter was to her in London. While this letter doesn’t indicate the entirety of their relationship dynamic, it displays that their lives weren’t as separate as some scholars would want them to be.”

Mitchell describes the importance of centering a story around women, especially beside a character as large as Shakespeare. Instead of imagining Agnes’ life as small in comparison to Shakespeare’s, “One of the things that I liked about the novel was that it’s not about Shakespeare and his rise to fame and success, but rather about the domestic life of the intelligent and deep-feeling woman he married. We don’t have diaries or letters, so fiction is doing the work (of defining) that (Agnes) wasn’t some small person who wasn’t cared for and who was just kind of caught up in the Shakespeare industry. She has her own important life.”

Mitchell explains that the villainization of Agnes’ character could possibly stem from a thoughtful act William Shakespeare and his wife did. Many scholars use the fact that the couple didn’t get married in the local parish church to diminish her character since this act was violating the religious conventions at the time. However, at the time they got married, Shakespeare’s father, John – a cruel character in the novel – was being pursued for his debts. Instead of getting married in the church, where people would have seen him and tried to collect, William and Agnes married elsewhere as a kindness to William’s father.

Act Five: Hamnet as a film

There are many films that have captured, or attempted to capture, the plays and fictionalized life of Shakespeare. Movies such as Shakespeare in Love offer viewers a way to enter his life, even if it’s heavily fictionalized. Films are often one of the most important tools used by professors, including Eggert. Films about Shakespeare or his plays allow viewers to better understand the content, through observing the choices actors and directors make.

“I show clips from films and theater adaptations; there are resources through the [��’s] libraries where you can see how if something is performed slightly differently, it emphasizes an entirely different meaning to the text,” Eggert says.

Colorado Shakespeare Festival remains popular

The Colorado Shakespeare Festival program has reached more than 140,000 Colorado students and continues to be an integral part of English courses in college. For this school cycle, Rich has adapted Hamlet into a digestible 30-minute and 45-minute play, depending on the student audience. Giguere and Schmidt’s work allows for teachers to prep their students on the plots, background and characters in the plays. Similarly to Rich’s opinion that anyone can interact with the material, Giguere states, “I don’t think you need to be a professional actor or violence prevention expert to use Shakespeare’s plays to think about patterns of violence. I think the plays unlock a lot about our own world and help us understand what it means to be human and what it means to live in a society.”

Although there are fictionalized elements, the stage adaptation of Hamnet was another way for viewers to understand Shakespeare and England at the time. The stage adaptation included people of various ethnic and racial backgrounds, something Schmidt notes was a larger part of Shakespeare’s London than people often consider.

“There is a lot of research that exists about how London, in particular, is a lot more diverse than we like to think it was – it was not all white. There were a lot of different people coming back and living in London and making their lives in London. I think [an all-white version of London] an outdated and disproven illusion of what life looked like,” Schmidt says.

Rich adds that the landscape in theatre for interpreting Shakespeare has moved beyond a binary system of comedy and tragedy. “When I was first starting out as an actor, auditioning for companies, they would ask for two contrasting monologues – one comedic, one tragic. It seems that many have moved away from that because that creates a two dimensional view of his plays, which in reality are more than just two genres of comedies and tragedies. He finds levity in serious moments and he finds gravity in the funny moments.”

The film version of Hamnet continues to break down these binaries and established structures through its storytelling. The mysticism that Rich sees in Shakespeare’s work is what Giguere recognizes in O’Farrell’s novel. Some film viewers may recognize the mysticism of the novel while also seeing the humanity of Shakespeare and his family.

Some 400 years later, Shakespeare can connect with individuals on a number of levels. Hamnet’s release in theaters offers viewers a fictionalized way to see him as a person and one version of the life he could have led. However, the concrete things people know about Shakespeare’s storytelling and genius are found in his works. Giguere emphasizes that people should read “all of them. Truly, every Shakespeare play collides with you in different ways depending on where you are in life or what the world is doing. I say this in a tongue-and-cheek way, read all of them, watch all of them. Because that’s what baffles me about these works, is that sometimes you’ll collide with a play and it just hits you in the right way where, ‘Oh my goodness, this sheds light on this other aspect of my life.’”

They Exit (the movie theater)

With the Nov. 26 cinematic release of Hamnet, CU Boulder scholars consider what we actually know about the famed playwright and why we’re still reading him four centuries later.

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Weaving the rhythms of place and people

Rachel Sauer — Thu, 04 Sep 2025 19:41:55 +0000

Weaving the rhythms of place and people Rachel Sauer Thu, 09/04/2025 - 13:41

CU Boulder Professor Marcia Douglas brings the images and memories that fill her writing, as well as her love of language and words, to The Ampersand

Listen to The Ampersand

On the days the book bus visited, Marcia Douglas waited anxiously outside her school in Kingston, Jamaica—a school that had no library—imagining the stories she’d discover inside, so different from the encyclopedias she had at home.

Even with her nose in the pages, she came to associate the delight of reading with her mother's voice, the neighbors laughing, reggae in the air, a dog's bark, the chatter and din that didn’t distract her but became the sounds that filled her well of language.

Now an award-winning author and hybrid artist, the intimacy with which Douglas writes about her childhood home of Jamaica—the Bob Marley rhythms, the taste of tamarind and saltfish fritters, the holiness of a shoeshine—doesn’t so much pull readers along as immerse them in the journey.

Marcia Douglas is an award-winning author, hybrid artist and a college professor of distinction in the CU Boulder Department of English.

For Douglas, a college professor of distinction in the �� Department of English, the words, the stories and the process of writing them are joy. While many authors talk about the isolation and loneliness of writing, Douglas sits at her desk in full community with ancestors, memories and the characters that she spins from these spaces.

Douglas recently joined host Erika Randall, CU Boulder interim dean of undergraduate education and professor of dance, on "The Ampersand,” a College of Arts and Sciences podcast. Randall and guests explore stories about ANDing as a “full sensory verb” that describes experience and possibility.

MARCIA DOUGLAS: As a writer, you plan certain things, and you have certain intentions of what you want to write. But in the end, I think that a lot of times, your characters emerge, and they tell you the story.

ERIKA RANDALL: They reveal.

DOUGLAS: Exactly. And that's part of the fun and the joy of writing a story—

RANDALL: Is listening to the story.

DOUGLAS: Right, listening to the story. Every day is a little bit of surprise when you return to it and you see where it's going, and that's how it emerges. That's how it comes along.

RANDALL: So, you've had this really incredible life with objects. And it feels primary in my research of you, and maybe not, but maybe-- because maybe it's one of the many threads of your stories. But I recalled you talking in an interview about how when you came from Jamaica to this country as a teenager, you had $10.

But what stood out to me was that your mother wrapped it in toilet paper. And it was the mention of the toilet paper that held me to your story and to the importance of what the thing was and what the thing wasn't. Can you talk to me about objects and their role in your life? And also, did you keep the toilet paper? You spent the $10. But the tissue—is it tucked in somewhere with the ticket, the return trip?

DOUGLAS: Right. I did not keep the toilet paper. The $10 got spent very quickly—

RANDALL: Yes, it did.

DOUGLAS: —because that's all that I had. I think her impulse to wrap it in the toilet paper had to do with the fact that at the time, there was some government regulation that you were only allowed to take $50 US out of the country. And she had $10 U.S. That's all she had in U.S. money. So, she wrapped it in this piece of toilet paper safely, and that's what I had. And the ticket, I still have.

RANDALL: You do. Where does it live in your life?

DOUGLAS: The ticket is housed in a little file with important papers. And that was meant to be my return ticket to go home. But I ended up not returning home, and I was an undocumented immigrant for many years.

I kept the ticket, though, and I still have the ticket. When you're undocumented, every little bit of paper is important somehow. At least that was my experience.

RANDALL: It felt like safety? It felt like identity?

DOUGLAS: Yeah, identity and this need to hold on to something that you might need, and that somehow is evidence of your existence, that documents you, that does document you in a certain kind of way. So, I think that was part of it, holding on to this ticket even long after it had expired.

But it also—if I'm to be my own psychoanalyst, I would say that it had something to do with a reminder of where I started, where I was from. And even though the ticket has long expired, also a reminder that you can always return, in some kind of way.

Marcia Douglas won a Whiting Award in fiction for her novel "The Marvellous Equations of the Dread: A Novel in Bass Riddim."

RANDALL: And you do, in memory and in word.

DOUGLAS: Yes.

RANDALL: Is it easy for you to return to the characters, to the clock tower, to the tree that was imagined or real, to the language, to the rhythm, to tone? Are there places in your body that you hold those stories or those memories that are easy to return to? Or do you have to really go into a state, or do you go-- do you go back to Jamaica, visit, take in and then return to the page? How does that live with you? How does your past stay in your present?

DOUGLAS: Yeah, it's easy for me to return. You can't always return physically. But home is a physical place, but also a spiritual place as well. And it's a place inside of you. So, I return in that way. And writing for me is also a way of returning home. That's how I return home. That's how I go back to Half Way Tree and interact with all of those characters. That's me literally going home.

RANDALL: So, thank you for taking us with you so clearly. I mean, I have never been to Jamaica. And many of the stories I've heard are from Midwesterners who take trips for spring break, and it's a very different reality. You tell a story that is—or stories, plural, in your "Electricity"—that was your dissertation-- "Comes?" Can you say that full title? That was—

DOUGLAS: No, that wasn't my—

RANDALL: That was your first book of poetry.

DOUGLAS: It was my first book of poetry, “Electricity Comes to Cocoa Bottom.”

RANDALL: So, there are stories there and poems there. And then in this, “The Marvellous Equations of the Dread,” that whole juxtaposition of a place and of home. So close that they are necessary, the beauty and the devastation that can come, the detail of what's left after a storm that makes one want to go, even though there's just been devastation. You hold all of those parts next to one another. Is that how it was for you growing up in Jamaica? That there's—everything is so close?

DOUGLAS: Growing up as a young person, I was always very observant, and--

RANDALL: You were a writer, or just a watcher?

DOUGLAS: I was a watcher, a writer in the making. I was a watcher. And I think—early on, you were talking about detail. And that's where my relationship to detail started, maybe, just by being a quiet child who would observe people and things and pay attention.

And so, I think that I was definitely a writer in the making because that's what you do as a writer, in part. You pay attention. That's really important. So yeah, that was my world. And I actually didn't grow up even with a lot of books.

RANDALL: You didn't?

DOUGLAS: No, I did not.

RANDALL: So, you didn't-- you mentioned in one interview, you didn't even know the job of being a writer was possible. You were pre-med, in your mind.

DOUGLAS: Right. Well, yeah, later on. But if I'm to push back further, to much younger days, I didn't grow up in a household with a lot of books. I remember we had a set of encyclopedias that my parents had bought, and I spent a lot of time with those encyclopedias.

RANDALL: That makes a lot of sense because you have this encyclopedic way of holding objects, story, detail, catalog. Did you just wear those out?

DOUGLAS: Yeah, those were my go-to spaces, the encyclopedias. And at the beginning of the school year, we always used to get a new set of books. And that always felt very precious, your new books at the beginning of the school year. But I didn't have a lot of just books around—

RANDALL: Fiction, story—

DOUGLAS: Yeah, that kind of thing. Every now and then, my parents might purchase a book for me or something like that. But I didn't have a lot of books. I remember when-- maybe from grade 1 through 3, I would say, or grades 1 through 4, I went to a school which didn't have a library, but what we had was—there was a mobile library truck.

RANDALL: Yes, I remember those. Yeah, we called it the bookmobile.

DOUGLAS: Yes. So, this was from the Jamaica Library Service, I suppose. And they came very intermittently, not very often at all, maybe once per term, as I recall. But it was always this big event. And you would get to pick out one book. The teacher would let you pick out one book.

RANDALL: How did you choose?

DOUGLAS: Yeah, but it was so exciting. And I also didn't feel deprived. I want to hasten to say that. I felt blessed and lucky that the library truck was coming and I would get to have a book. So that was one source of books for me. So, I didn't have a lot of reading material, but I loved to read, loved the language.

My other source of language for me would be from church. My father was a preacher, and he was also a roadside evangelist. And he would preach on street corners. And so I think listening to people like him was one of my language wells also. And all of this-- you don't know it at the time. But I look back.

RANDALL: Yeah, and then you go in and there it is.

DOUGLAS: Right, on my development of a writer. And that was definitely one of the pieces, listening to him read from the Bible. And he also wasn't a very good reader either. He used to struggle with it. But yeah-- so that was the writer in the making, I would say.

Listen to The Ampersand

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CU Boulder Professor Marcia Douglas brings the images and memories that fill her writing, as well as her love of language and words, to The Ampersand.

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We’re still tasting the spice of 1960s sci-fi

Rachel Sauer — Fri, 29 Aug 2025 13:00:00 +0000

We’re still tasting the spice of 1960s sci-fi Rachel Sauer Fri, 08/29/2025 - 07:00

Bradley Worrell

With this month marking Dune’s 60th anniversary, CU Boulder’s Benjamin Robertson discusses the book’s popular appeal while highlighting the dramatic changes science fiction experienced following its publication

Sixty years ago this month, a novel about a galactic battle over a desert planet valued for its mystical spice forever altered the face of science fiction.

Authored by Frank Herbert, Dune would go on to sell more than 20 million copies, be translated into more than 20 languages and become one of the bestselling science fiction novels of all time, spawning several sequels and movie adaptions that have further boosted its popularity.

Benjamin Robertson, a CU Boulder associate professor of English, pursues a research and teaching focus on genre fiction.

In retrospect, it’s hard to quantify how important Dune was to the genre of science fiction, says Benjamin Robertson, a �� Department of English associate professor whose areas of specialty includes contemporary literature and who teaches a science fiction class. That’s because the status Dune attained, along with other popular works at the time, helped transition science fiction from something that was primarily found in specialty magazines to a legitimate genre within the world of book publishing, he says.

Robertson says a number of factors made Dune a remarkable book upon its publication in August 1965, including Herbert’s elaborate world building; its deep philosophical exploration of religion, politics and ecology; and the fact that its plot was driven by its characters rather than by technology. Additionally, the book tapped into elements of 1960s counterculture with its focus on how consuming a spice harvested on the planet Arrakis could allow users to experience mystical visions and enhance their consciousness, Robertson says.

Journey beyond Arrakis with a different kind of dune

“There’s also the element of the chosen one narrative in the book, which is appealing to at least a certain segment of the culture,” he says. The book’s protagonist, Paul Atreides, suffers a great loss and endures many trials before emerging as the leader who amasses power and dethrones the established authorities, he notes.

While Dune found commercial success by blending many different story elements and themes in a new way that engaged readers, it’s worthwhile to consider the book in relation to other works of science fiction being produced in the 1960s, Robertson says. It was during that turbulent time that a new generation of writers emerged, creating works very different from their predecessors in the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s, which is often considered the Golden Age of Science Fiction.

Whereas many Golden Age science fiction writers tended to set their tales in outer space, to make technology the focus of their stories and to embrace the idea that human know-how could overcome nearly any obstacle, Robertson says many science fiction writers in the 1960s looked to reinvent the genre.

“The 1960s is probably when, for me personally, I feel like science fiction gets interesting,” he says. “I’m not a big fan of what’s called the Golden Age of Science Fiction—the fiction of Asimov or Heinlein. The ‘60s is interesting because of what’s going on culturally, with the counterculture, with student protests and the backlash to the conformities of the 1950s.”

New Wave sci-fi writers make their mark

In 1960s Great Britain, in particular, writers for New Worlds science fiction magazine came to be associated with the term New Wave, which looked inward to examine human psychology and motivations while also tackling topics like sexuality, gender roles and drug culture.

“This new generation of writers grew up reading science fiction, but they were dissatisfied with both the themes and the way it was written,” Robertson says. “One of the New World’s most notable writers, J.G. Ballard, talked about shifting away from, quote-unquote, outer space to inner space.

“That dovetailed with other writers who weren’t necessarily considered New Wave but were writing soft science fiction that was not focused on technology itself—such as space ships and time travel—but more about exploring the impact of technologies on humanity and on how it changes our relationship with the planet, the solar system and how we relate to each other.”

New Wave authors also wrote about world-ending catastrophes, including nuclear war and ecological degradation. Meanwhile, many British New Wave writers were not afraid to be seen as iconoclasts who challenged established religious and political norms.

“Michael Moorcock, the editor of New Worlds, self-identified as an anarchist, and Ballard was exemplary for challenging authority in his works. He was not just interested in saying, ‘This form of government is bad or compromised, or capitalism is bad, but actually the way we convey those ideas has been compromised,’” Robertson says. “It wasn’t enough for him to identify those systems that are oppressing us; Ballard argued we have to describe them in ways that estranges those ideas.

“And that’s what science fiction classically does—it estranges us. It shows us our world in some skewed manner, because it’s extrapolating from here to the future and imagining …what might a future look like that we couldn’t anticipate, based upon the situation we are in now.”

American science fiction writers might not have pushed the boundaries quite as far their British counterparts, Robertson says, but counterculture ideas found expression in some literature of the time. He points specifically to Harlan Ellison, author of the post-apocalyptic short story “I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream,” who also served as editor of the sci-fi anthology Dangerous Visions, a collection of short stories that were notable for their depiction of sex in science fiction.

Robertson says other American sci-fi writers of the time who embraced elements of the counterculture include Robert Heinlein, whose Stranger in a Strange Land explored the concept of free love, and Philip K. Dick, who addressed the dangers of authority and capitalism in some of his works and whose stories sometimes explored drug use, even as the author was taking illicit drugs to maintain his prolific output.

“Dune definitely broke out into the mainstream—and the fact that Hollywood is continuing to produce movies based upon the book today says something about its staying power,” says CU Boulder scholar Benjamin Robertson.

Meanwhile, Robertson notes that science fiction during the 1960s saw a more culturally diverse group of writers emerge, including Ursula K. Le Guin, the feminist author of such works as The Left Hand of Darkness and The Lathe of Heaven; Madeliene L’Engle, known for her work A Wrinkle in Time; and some lesser-known but still influential writers such as Samuel R. Delaney, one of the first African American and queer science fiction authors, known for his works Babel-17 and Nova.

At the same time, even authors from behind eastern Europe’s Iron Curtain were gaining recognition in the West, including Stanislaw Lem of Poland, author of the novel Solaris, and brothers Arkady and Boris Strugatsky in the Soviet Union, authors of the novella Ashes of Bikini and many short stories.

Impact of 1960s sci-fi remains long lasting

As the 1960s and 1970s gave way to the 1980s, a new sci-fi genre started to take hold: Cyberpunk. Sharing elements with New Wave, Cyberpunk is a dystopian science fiction subgenre combining advanced technology, including artificial intelligence, with societal collapse.

Robertson says the 1984 debut of William Gibson’s book Neuromancer is widely recognized as a foundational work of Cyberpunk.

While works of 1960s science fiction are now more than five decades old, Robertson says many of them generally have held up well over time.

“Dune definitely broke out into the mainstream—and the fact that Hollywood is continuing to produce movies based upon the book today says something about its staying power,” he says. “I think the works of Ursula K. Le Guin, particularly the Left Hand of Darkness, is a great read and a lot of fun to teach. And Philip K. Dick is always capable of shocking you, not with gore or sex but just with narrative twists and turns.”

If anything, Dick is actually more popular today than when he was writing his books and short stories back in the 1960s, Robertson says, pointing to the fact that a number of them have been made into films—most notably Minority Report and Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? (which was re-titled Blade Runner).

“At the same time, I think one of the dangers of science fiction is thinking what was written in the 1960s somehow predicts what happens later,” Robertson says. “It can look that way. But, as someone who values historicism, I think it’s important to think about cultural objects in the time they were produced. So, the predictions that Philip K. Dick was making were based upon the knowledge he had in the 1960s, so saying what happened in the 1980s is what he predicted in the 1960s isn’t strictly accurate, because what was happening in the 1980s was coming out of a very different understanding of science, of politics and of technology.

“What I always ask people to remember about science fiction is that it’s about more than the time that it’s written about—it’s about what the future could be, not about what the future actually becomes.”

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With this month marking Dune’s 60th anniversary, CU Boulder’s Benjamin Robertson discusses the book’s popular appeal while highlighting the dramatic changes science fiction experienced following its publication.

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Top illustration: Gary Jamroz-Palma

Up, up and away … to another Superman movie

Rachel Sauer — Wed, 09 Jul 2025 13:30:00 +0000

Up, up and away … to another Superman movie Rachel Sauer Wed, 07/09/2025 - 07:30

Bradley Worrell

CU Boulder’s William Kuskin, who teaches a course on comics and graphic novels, considers Superman’s enduring appeal as Hollywood debuts a new adaptation about the Man of Steel

A new Superman movie arrives in theaters Friday, raising the question: Will American moviegoers turn out in large numbers to watch it?

Some recent superhero-themed films from Marvel and DC Comics have underperformed at the box office, prompting a debate about whether moviegoers are suffering from superhero fatigue. However, there’s some reason to believe Superman will prevail against lethargy thanks in part to a dedicated, supportive fan base, says William Kuskin, �� Department of English chair, who teaches a popular course on comics and graphic novels and whose expertise includes popular culture and film.

“The comic shop boys I hang out with have been talking about this film for a bit now. To normal mortals, we’re probably all exhausted with the latest summer blockbuster movies, but I think there are going to be a good number of fans who will go see it,” he says.

CU Boulder Professor William Kuskin, chair of the Department of English, notes that the new film Superman may prevail against "superhero fatigue" thanks in part to a dedicated, supportive fan base.

Even beyond those most ardent of Superman fans, Kuskin says he believes the Man of Steel continues to enjoy approval in popular culture in part because he uses his superhuman powers to fight for “truth, justice and the American way”—making him a symbol of unity in a time when the country is deeply divided.

Additionally, Kuskin says that with this new film, DC Comics has signaled it is turning away from the dark, gritty tone that permeated its previous superhero films, most notably the Batman trilogy directed by Christopher Nolan and the 2021 Zack Snyder Justice League movie, where Batman has a dark vision of Superman being controlled by the supervillain Darkseid. Kuskin says he believes such a move could help broaden the film’s appeal as DC seeks to relaunch the franchise.

“I think the goal with the new movie is to be not so dark; it’s to brighten him (Superman) up and in some ways bring us back to the model that (Superman actor) Christopher Reeves set in the 1970s,” he says. “I think that’s also reflected in the choice to have James Gunn direct, as they (DC Studios) were looking for a director who could bring some joy to the franchise. ”

Gunn previously directed several Marvel films, including the Guardians of the Galaxy trilogy, where he earned a reputation for bringing some charm and levity to the franchise, Kuskin says. As just one example, he points to Star-Lord’s extended disco-dance scene to the tune “Come and Get Your Love” in the opening of the first film.

What’s old is new again

While DC Comics may be looking to get audiences back into theaters by recreating Superman’s positive, wholesome appeal in movies from the 1970s and 1980s, Kuskin says it’s important to note that Superman’s persona—and his superpowers—have evolved since he first debuted in Action Comics in 1938.

Upon his introduction, Superman was remarkable for being “faster than a speeding bullet, more powerful than a locomotive (and) able to leap tall buildings at a single bound.” However, as Kuskin notes, Superman couldn’t actually fly in the beginning, and many of his other powers were added over time to make him more formidable.

Perhaps even more notably, Kuskin says Superman could be an antagonist if the situation called for it.

“The very first Superman story has him saving a woman who has been falsely accused of murder. Superman has to break down the governor’s door and insist in no uncertain terms that the governor rescind her sentence,” he says. “His message is that the ethical choice is always obvious—even if it means turning against the government, which makes him a figure, essentially, of anarchy.

Superman debuted in Action Comics in 1938. (Art by Joe Shuster and color by Jack Adler)

“The story conveys that it takes someone with real guts to right those wrongs; it’s a really powerful message.”

As Superman entered the World War II years, Kuskin says, he joined the pantheon of superheroes who battled the Axis powers in the pages of comic books. Around that time, Superman took on the qualities of not just a hero but an American savior, Kustin adds—even though his well-known origin story has him being born on the planet Krypton.

“With the embrace of ‘truth, justice and the American way,’ that’s how Superman transforms from something of an anarchist to this figure of Americanness,” Kuskin says.

He notes it was also during that time period that Superman came to be defined as a contrast to DC Comics’ other main hero protagonist—Batman. Whereas Superman embraces authority and represents a figure of absolutism, Batman tends to operate outside of the law. In fact, in Batman’s formative years in the late 1930s and early 1940s, he used guns and operated “as a masked vigilante seeking to make (Gotham) city safe for commerce,” Kuskin says.

At the same time, Kuskin adds, with no superpowers to speak of, as a practical matter, Batman was forced to rely on his intelligence, his cunning and his gadgets.

Meanwhile, Kuskin says it’s worth noting that Batman and Superman are derivative of earlier comic book heroes, particularly Olga Mesmer, a superhero from Venus whose superpowers roughly mirrored those of Superman, including super-strength and X-ray vision, and Lee Falk’s The Phantom, who was a somewhat wealthy costumed crime fighter with no superpowers, akin to Batman, who relies on his intelligence and skill with his two handguns.

Masking and unmasking

Kuskin says one of the more interesting aspects of Superman and Batman relates to masking and unmasking, and what it means symbolically to their roles as heroes.

“Superman is a figure of extroversion, so for him it’s all about unmasking. It’s about going from glasses—which indicate a studious nature and a monastic sensibility—to no glasses,” he says. “My read of Superman is that the glasses are a signal of allowing himself a release, while Batman is the opposite. He goes from no glasses to putting on a mask, so it’s a signal of masking and turning inward.

“To put it another way, Superman is the extrovert who can’t wait to shed his suit and tie and leap out the window and proclaim his affinity for humanity with all his boundless energy. Batman is the exact opposite,” Kuskin says. “He needs to hide his external nature to deal with the world, not as himself, but as the truly dark version within himself. That expression is not very healthy, but it’s the only way he can really make a difference in the world. It’s effective, but it’s not a celebration in any way; it’s more of a revelation.”

In the end, Kuskin argues, all superheroes fall into one of those two molds, as an extrovert or the introvert. If that’s the case, it begs the question: Which one does Kuskin prefer?

“Well, I have Batman tattooed on my arm, and I don’t have one of Superman, so that probably tells you something,” he says with a laugh. “For one thing, Batman has the narrative constraint of not using guns because of his ethical position. It’s also a constraint that makes it even harder for him to be victorious, and yet Batman never loses. And then there’s the whole issue with his traumatic childhood, so he’s not even playing on a level playing field. He’s got problems and he has to deal with those, too.”

Meanwhile, back at the cineplex

While superhero movies have enjoyed a mixed reception as of late, Kuskin says he believes a lot of that has to do with the quality of the storytelling (or lack thereof) rather than audience support for the superhero genre. He gives special credit to the Marvel franchise for the strong continuity of its storylines across multiple films, and particular kudos for the storytelling in its Avengers Infinity War and Avengers Endgame movies.

“I loved Endgame and Infinity War. I thought they were wonderfully crafted and heartfelt,” he says. “After that, I didn’t find much joy in either Marvel or DC offerings. I did really like Robert Pattinson’s rendition of Batman. I felt he captured the sense of introversion that lies at the heart of Batman. And there’s a scene where he makes a public appearance as Bruce Wayne and he’s so beaten and so broken. That is the reality of Batman, so I really enjoyed that movie.

“Will I go see this new Superman movie? The jury’s still out,” Kuskin says. However, after watching the 7-minute movie trailer, he says he’s a bit underwhelmed, based upon what he sees as an over-reliance on CGI effects and slow-motion punches—seemingly at the expense of a compelling story.

“I still think Batman is king. Society has become despairing and Batman’s despair speaks so powerfully,” he says. “Still, Superman is a tremendous property, so we’ll see what DC studios can do.”

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CU Boulder’s William Kuskin, who teaches a course on comics and graphic novels, considers Superman’s enduring appeal as Hollywood debuts a new adaptation about the Man of Steel.

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Actor David Corenswet plays Superman in the film being released July 11. (Photo: Warner Bros)

‘Just being visible is an act of resistance’

Rachel Sauer — Tue, 13 May 2025 23:23:22 +0000

‘Just being visible is an act of resistance’ Rachel Sauer Tue, 05/13/2025 - 17:23

Collette Mace

In acclaimed new novel, CU Boulder Professor Stephen Graham Jones explores ideas of ‘what an Indian is or isn’t’

When horror author Stephen Graham Jones was teaching his graduate seminar on monsters, he made sure to have his class spend some time on The Lesser Dead, a vampire novel written by Christopher Buehlman in 2014. He remembers thinking, “What’s the point of anyone else writing vampires ever again, when Buehlman has already done it so perfectly?”

Nevertheless, he decided to try doing just that. The idea he started out with was a single image of a small church with a dwindling congregation. At the end of the sermon, everyone leaves except for “one Indian guy sitting in the back, staring at the pastor through darkened glasses and (with) a jaded expression,” Jones says. With that and his self-defined challenge to write a vampire novel that had never been done before, his recently published novel The Buffalo Hunter Hunter—widely hailed as a horror masterpiece—was dreamed into existence.

Novels like this, which are centered around Indigenous stories and values, are important for many reasons, says Jones, a �� professor of distinction in the Department of English. Specifically, he sees writing by Indigenous authors as a reminder that “we, Indians who shouldn’t be around anymore, are still here. Just being visible is an act of resistance.”

In his new novel The Buffalo Hunter Hunter, Stephen Graham Jones, a CU Boulder professor of distinction in the Department of English, centers around Indigenous stories and values.

Jones likes to play into the narrative that Indigenous people don’t always match up with the stereotypes forced onto them in post-colonial America. In fact, he employs stereotypes as a narrative tool often in his novels, including in The Buffalo Hunter Hunter. He uses his pastor character, Arthur, as an embodiment of what he perceives to be American ideas of “what an Indian is or isn’t,” and distorts these preconceived notions to further the novel’s horror.

He also plays with the ideas of stereotypes and performativity later in the novel, when a non-Indigenous character abuses his power and knowledge by pretending to be Indigenous himself. Jones says this event was inspired by the short story “Welcome to Your Authentic Indian Experience” by Rebecca Roanhorse, which also examines stereotypes of what it means to be Indigenous and how society tends to accept caricatures of Indigeneity—mostly because of the stereotypes we’ve been fed in the media all our lives, Jones says.

The irony in both Jones’ and Roanhorse’s work is that the actual Indigenous characters are cast aside and told that they are, in fact, the inauthentic ones.

Stories within stories

Another distinctive characteristic of The Buffalo Hunter Hunter is that it’s a nest narrative. Readers get three perspectives throughout the novel, beginning with the Native character’s stories, which are recorded in a journal by the pastor, Arthur, and then read by Arthur’s many-time-great niece, Etsy. “Etsy wasn’t originally part of the story,” Jones says, “but I found that I needed her perspective in 2013 in order to really probe where I wanted to in the story.”

That’s one of his favorite things about writing horror, Jones says: The stakes in horror novels are high, and readers often know immediately where the central conflict lies. This leaves room in the text to take a deeper look and probe who and what makes good horror, and why it makes us feel that sense of fear, disturbance or unease.

Jones likes to explore inner turmoil and complications within his characters. For example, he wants it to be clear from the beginning that Arthur’s definitely not the protagonist in the story, and yet he wants the reader to be endeared to the pastor from the first journal entry. This again plays with the idea of Arthur’s position and preconceived notions of being an American “everyman,” illustrating how Jones can flip stereotypes on their heads to create additional nuances.

Research was a big part of the conceptualization of the novel. Jones knew he wanted to have a location central to the buffalo hunts of the early 20th century, and through both travel knowledge and online research, he landed on the real-life Miles City, Montana. Miles City served as a multicultural hub at the time, where many trappers and hunters sold their trophies, most often beaver and buffalo hides taken from the nearby Blackfoot reservation.

Good Stab, the Indigenous man at the back of the church, hails from that reservation. Jones also discovered that there was a strong Baptist presence in Miles City in the early 20th century and positioned Arthur as a Baptist preacher for that reason.

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In acclaimed new novel, CU Boulder Professor Stephen Graham Jones explores ideas of ‘what an Indian is or isn’t.’

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Recognizing a century of boats against the current

Rachel Sauer — Wed, 23 Apr 2025 19:17:08 +0000

Recognizing a century of boats against the current Rachel Sauer Wed, 04/23/2025 - 13:17

Collette Mace

The Great Gatsby remains relevant for modern readers by shapeshifting with the times, says CU Boulder scholar Martin Bickman

“So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.”

The final words of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s classic novel, The Great Gatsby—published 100 years ago this month—are among the most known and appreciated in American literature.

Martin Bickman, a CU Boulder professor of English, notes that the intentional vagueness of The Great Gatsby helps readers of all generations connect with the characters.

And according to Martin Bickman, a �� professor of English, this line and the novel’s conclusion reflect the age in which it was written and neatly ends a novel that seems to capture the American psyche.

But why is The Great Gatsby considered the Great American Novel? Not because it’s great or because it’s American, Bickman explains—although it is both. This novel has remained relevant from generation to generation because it shapeshifts with the times, continuing to carry themes that Americans are bred to notice.

Questions of the American dream, wealth, class standing and ambition are central to American values in both 1925 and today. And while these themes look very different to the modern American, Bickman says the intentional vagueness of the novel helps readers of all generations connect with the characters.

To understand this, Bickman, a CU President’s Teaching Scholar who has taught a course called American Novel, cites “reader response theory,” a framework he emphasizes is critical in the study of literature. According to reader response theory, the reader of a text to take must take an active role in constructing the meaning within the text; if readers look only at a novel through the perspective of the author, that neglects much of the text’s meaning.

For this reason, no text can be interpreted the exact way by two different people. Readers approach texts differently as a result of their position in the world, and the experiences that have shaped them inform their understanding of what they read. The text then becomes a blank canvas for what readers project onto it, Bickman says

Seeing ourselves in Gatsby

What does this have to do with Gatsby? According to Bickman, the title character is just two-dimensional enough to serve as a perfect projection screen for readers of the novel. He’s mysterious, allowing the narrator, Nick Calloway, to cast his own assumptions about the world and the wealthy onto him, as well as vague enough to allow the reader to project their own internal thoughts and biases onto him.

As well as having characters that reflect the reader in personality and perceptions, The Great Gatsby also reflects classic American messages that are relevant today.

Because of his intentional ambiguity, Gatsby as a character can reflect what the reader thinks of many different things, including the elite, the rich and even the quintessential American dreamer.

This is how The Great Gatsby becomes a chameleon, remaining relevant in era, despite its age, Bickman says. As well as having characters that reflect the reader in personality and perceptions, the novel also reflects classic American messages that are relevant today.

The green light on Daisy’s dock, for example, represents the unattainable hopes for the future that stem from the inability to transcend the past. This feeling is still present, and most likely always will be in a country that believes in the possibility of a glowing future as long as we just work hard enough to get there—such is, in essence, the American dream, Bickman says.

It also showcases the all-to-frequent pain of the American dream. Although Bickman says the billionaires of today had no equal in Fitzgerald’s time, the uneasiness surrounding the callousness of the rich is on full display in Gatsby. Daisy, for example, named for the beautiful and delicate flower that Gatsby sees her as, is just as cruel and selfish as any of the men around her. She was the one driving the car, after all.

However, as she comes from “self-earned” money, and as someone who has seemingly “won” at the American dream, does she get a pass for her selfishness? In a way, she seems to, at least for the moment. And as time moves on, and the rich keep getting richer and the poor keep getting poorer, it seems that the original questions of whether the rich can be callous changes to whether the rich can be cruel—a key difference in how the world works, according to Bickman.

“It’s a real pathology now,” he says, “I mean, these people are cruel. The richest of the rich in the 1920s were nothing like today’s billionaires.”

So the lessons of The Great Gatsby remain relevant, Bickman says, suggesting that modern readers should take a deep look between the lines and wonder what Gatsby can show us about ourselves.

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'The Great Gatsby' remains relevant for modern readers by shapeshifting with the times, says CU Boulder scholar Martin Bickman.

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Top image: Warner Bros.

Did ChatGPT write this? No, but how would you know?

Rachel Sauer — Mon, 03 Mar 2025 21:34:42 +0000

Did ChatGPT write this? No, but how would you know? Rachel Sauer Mon, 03/03/2025 - 14:34

Collette Mace

In her Writing in the Age of AI course, CU Boulder’s Teresa Nugent helps students think critically about new technology

One of the most contentious subjects in academia now is the use of AI in writing. Many educators fear that students use it as a substitute for critical thinking. And while students fear that they’re going to be accused of using it instead of doing their own critical thinking, some still use it anyway.

Some students, like their instructors, fear what AI is capable of, and they are highly uncomfortable with the risks associated with its use.

Teresa Nugent, a CU Boulder teaching associate professor of English, invites students in the Writing in the Age of AI course to experiment with AI as part of their writing process and critically reflect on how these tools influence their ideas.

Teresa Nugent, a �� teaching associate professor of English, has seen all these perspectives. When she first read the 2023 essay “I’m a Student. You Have No Idea How Much We’re Using ChatGPT” by Columbia University undergraduate Owen Kichizo Terry, she knew that it was time for educators and students to better understand AI use in writing, even though it was scary.

Two years later, she is in her second semester of teaching ENGL 3016, Writing in the Age of AI. In this course, Nugent invites students to experiment with AI as part of their writing process and critically reflect on how these tools influence their ideas. Her students have conversations with chatbots about topics that they know well and evaluate whether the bots actually know what they’re talking about.

Nugent says she hopes that taking a class in which they are encouraged to talk about AI use allows students to explore possibilities, play with these tools, test their capabilities and determine how best to use them. By teaching students how to use AI as a tool to help develop their critical thinking skills instead of just avoiding that hard work, Nugent aims to prompt students to think about the wider implications of AI, and where it can ethically fit into an academic curriculum.

“We as educators have an obligation to help our students develop the skills that they’re going to need in the world that is developing around all of us,” Nugent says. “If we try to pretend AI isn’t here, we are doing students a disservice. We need to find ways to inspire students to want to learn; we need to spark their curiosity and motivate them to find meaningful connections between course content and the world.”

Mixed feelings about AI

Not all students are enthusiastic about AI. Nugent explains that, since the class fulfills an upper-level writing requirement, she has students of all different majors and experience levels. Many students, she notes, come in with a great deal of apprehension about using AI, something the class discusses openly on day one.

Nugent asks her students to think of a story they’ve been told—often by a parent or grandparent—about what life was like before some commonplace technology—like cell phones or the internet—was invented.

“If we try to pretend AI isn’t here, we are doing students a disservice," says Teresa Nugent, CU Boulder teaching associate professor of English.

Someday, she reminds her students, they'll tell stories about what the world was like before generative AI. New technology is always emerging, and the best way to adapt to the changing world is to keep learning about it, she says.

Nugent also acknowledges the real risks that come with AI use. She offers students a plethora of readings expressing a range of perspectives on the subject—including Neil Postman’s concerns about the unintended consequences of technological innovations and Mustafa Suleyman’s warning about the need to contain AI in his book The Coming Wave. Students read writings about how current educators have grappled with the release of AI chatbots and science fiction media depictions of AI, including the film Her and the dystopian serial Black Mirror.

Students also read texts about the harmful effects of AI on the environment, the issues of class and social justice that are entangled with AI use and psychological studies concerning AI.

Overall, Nugent says she wants students to leave the class with an informed understanding of AI. For their final project, students are required to research an aspect of AI in which they are particularly interested.

She says this leads to a wide array of research topics, often based on students’ majors; for example, an environmental studies major might research how to use renewable energy sources to power data centers. After writing academic papers, students reframe their research into a “blog” format that a general audience would find easily understandable.

“Knowledge is power,” Nugent says. “Being well informed about something always gives one more of a sense of agency than not being informed.” Ultimately, Nugent says she hopes that students will leave the class feeling confident and prepared to offer their knowledge about AI to society and keep themselves and others informed about this moment in technological history.

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In her Writing in the Age of AI course, CU Boulder’s Teresa Nugent helps students think critically about new technology.

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Working with Data for Social Change symposium set for March 14

Rachel Sauer — Fri, 28 Feb 2025 18:15:53 +0000

Working with Data for Social Change symposium set for March 14 Rachel Sauer Fri, 02/28/2025 - 11:15

The all-day event will bring together local and national scholars engaged in digital public humanities projects to advocate for social change

The Data Advocacy for All project on the �� campus is sponsoring a one-day Working with Data for Social Change symposium March 14.

This all-day event brings together local and national scholars engaged in digital public humanities projects to advocate for social change and who have worked to strengthen ethical data humanities education in higher education, said Laurie Gries, associate professor of English and director of the Program for Writing and Rhetoric, who is spearheading the symposium.

What: Working with Data for Social Change symposium

When: March 14

Where: In-person at CASE KOBL 140 and online; register here

All faculty, staff and students who want to learn more about the data humanities are invited.

The symposium aims not only to demonstrate and underscore the value of data advocacy research for the humanities at large, but also to generate collective ideas as to how to data advocacy education can be enhanced across the disciplines in higher education, according to Gries.

She said she believes the symposium will be of interest to faculty, staff and students who want to learn more about the data humanities and, more particularly, about data advocacy as a focus of research and/or pedagogy. Those interested in attending in-person or via Zoom can register here.

The symposium will feature scholars and activists from around the country, including Melissa Borja, Nasreen Abd Elal and Sylvia Fernández Quintanilla, who have advocated with data for social change on projects including the Virulent Hate Project, Visualizing Palestine and Torn Apart/Separados, respectively. Additionally, Gries will talk about her data-driven project, the Swastika Counter Project, which was recently profiled in Colorado Arts and Sciences Magazine.

Gries said the symposium also will feature scholars who have worked intently to build data humanities education within and beyond the CU Boulder campus. For instance, in addition to featured speaker Melanie Walsh discussing the Responsible Data Sets in Context project, David Glimp, Nathan Pieplow and other CU Boulder and CU Denver professors will speak about their efforts to train students how to engage data through critical, humanistic frameworks and how to use data effectively to address matters of significance to them and their communities.

Speaking of Gries’ efforts to spearhead the symposium, Glimp said, “Laurie has assembled a terrific team of collaborators to develop her vision of not only cultivating data literacy among our students but also equipping students with the tools to argue with data. By ‘arguing with data,’ I mean both being able to identify and assess all the ways data-backed arguments can mislead or go wrong, and being able to craft effective, responsible arguments with data about matters of the greatest urgency for our world.”

The Data Advocacy for All project was the recipient of a $300,000 CU Next Award in May 2022.

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The all-day event will bring together local and national scholars engaged in digital public humanities projects to advocate for social change.

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It’s a bird! It’s a plane! It’s another superhero film!

Rachel Sauer — Wed, 19 Feb 2025 20:45:54 +0000

It’s a bird! It’s a plane! It’s another superhero film! Rachel Sauer Wed, 02/19/2025 - 13:45

Doug McPherson

Following a blockbuster opening weekend for Captain America: Brave New World, CU Boulder’s Benjamin Robertson reflects on the appeal of superhero franchises and why they dominate studio release schedules

Captain America continues to conquer obstacles and crush villains―not bad for a man approaching age 85.

The comic book hero made his debut in print in December 1940, then on TV in 1966 and hit the silver screen in 2011―gaining massive momentum along with way. This past Presidents Day weekend, the fourth installment of the superhero series, “Captain America: Brave New World,” hit the top spot at the box office in the United States, and earned $192.4 million around the globe.

Benjamin Robertson, a CU Boulder assistant professor of English, notes that superhero franchises are comforting in their repetitiveness.

It’s the fourth-best Presidents Day launch on record, behind three other superhero movies: Black Panther, Deadpool and Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania.

What’s going on here? What’s giving Captain America his muscle? And why do folks keep going back to these same stories, characters and worlds over and over?

Benjamin Robertson, a �� assistant professor of English who specializes in popular culture, film and digital media, says there are two answers: “One, the genre is comforting in its repetitiveness. This is the least interesting answer, however,” he says.

The second answer appears a little more sinister. Robertson says viewers return to these stories because creators make “story worlds that solicit consumers’ attention and that must always grow and that turn increasingly inward.”

He says the first Iron Man film is about America intervening in the Middle East following Sept. 11, but later MCU (Marvel Cinematic Universe, the franchise behind many superhero movies) films seem less and less about real or historical matters and more about the MCU itself.

“As a colleague once put it, every MCU film is simply the trailer for the next MCU film, the result of a strategy that seeks to create a fandom that can’t escape from the tangled narrative that the franchise tells,” he explains.

In short, Robertson says if consumers want to know the full narrative—the full world that these films and series describe—they have to go to the theater. “As this world becomes about itself rather than about external history or real-world events, a certain ‘lock in’ manifests, making it harder and harder to not see these films if one wants to understand the world they create.”

‘Flatter American identities’

Actor Anthony Mackie plays the titular Captain America in Captain America: Brave New World. (Photo: Marvel Studios)

Another trick is that MCU films tend to “flatter American identities” by celebrating militarism, focusing on charismatic heroes who try to do the right thing unconstrained by historical necessity and suggesting that everything will work out in the end, Robertson says.

“I can see the more comforting aspects of these films having appeal to many consumers. Don’t fear climate change, fear Thanos [a supervillain] and other embodiments of badness,” he says.

As to the question of whether franchises are just growing their worlds and the characters in them, or retelling the same story because it makes money, Robertson says each MCU film is a piece of intellectual property, but an individual film is far less valuable than a world.

“A film might spawn a sequel or sequels, but without developing the world, the sequels will likely be of lesser quality and, eventually, no longer be profitable or not profitable enough to warrant further investment,” Robertson says. “But if producers develop the world into a complex environment that contains numerous characters with distinct and yet intersecting story arcs, well, then you have the foundation for potentially unlimited storytelling and profit in the future.”

He adds that in that context, Captain America has obvious value as an individual character, but he has far more value as part of a world that can develop around him and allow for new actors to play him as he evolves with the world.

So, as the world grows as an intellectual property and in narrative development, "so does the potential for profit, although we may now be seeing the limits of this dynamic as some MCU films have not been doing as well at the box office over the past five years, although there are likely several factors that contribute to this decline.”

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Following a blockbuster opening weekend for ‘Captain America: Brave New World,’ CU Boulder’s Benjamin Robertson reflects on the appeal of superhero franchises and why they dominate studio release schedules.

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Top photo: Marvel Studios

How ardently we admire and love 'Pride and Prejudice'

Rachel Sauer — Fri, 14 Feb 2025 17:16:15 +0000

How ardently we admire and love 'Pride and Prejudice' Rachel Sauer Fri, 02/14/2025 - 10:16

Collette Mace

Are Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Darcy the greatest love story? CU Boulder’s Grace Rexroth weighs in

What is the greatest love story of all time?

This is a question many like to consider, discuss and debate, especially around Valentine’s Day. Whether you’re more of a romantic at heart or a casual softie, you’ve more than likely heard or expressed the opinion that there is no love story quite like Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Darcy in Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice.

Despite being more than 200 years old, something about this classic novel transcends centuries and social changes to remain a text with which many people connect, whether on the screen, stage or in the pages of the novel.

Grace Rexroth, a CU Boulder teaching assistant professor of English, notes that Pride and Prejudice has captivated audiences for more than two centuries in part because it appeals to what people—specifically women—have wanted and fantasized about through different eras following its publication.

What makes this love story so memorable and so beloved? Is it truly the greatest love story of all time, or is there something else about it that draws readers in again and again?

According to Grace Rexroth, a teaching assistant professor in the �� Department of English who is currently teaching a global women’s literature course focused on writing about love, the historical context in which Jane Austen wrote Pride and Prejudice is crucial to understanding the novel's inner workings.

The Regency Era was a period of intense revolution and change. There still were very strict social norms surrounding marriage and status, which are evident in the novel, but it’s also important to consider that proto-feminist ideals, such as those expressed by Mary Wollstonecraft, were influencing conversations about the position of women in society, Rexroth notes.

Even at the time of publication, Pride and Prejudice was perceived differently between opposing political groups—more conservative thinkers saw it as a story that still rewarded conservative values, such as humility, beauty (always beauty) and a reserved disposition. Other, more progressive readers saw it as standing up to the status quo.

To this day, readers and scholars often debate whether Austen was writing to criticize or praise Regency Era ideas about women’s autonomy. In The Making of Jane Austen, author Devoney Looser observes, “It sounds impossible, but Jane Austen has been and remains a figure at the vanguard of reinforcing tradition and promoting social change.”

Nuance helps it endure

The fact that Pride and Prejudice lends itself to different interpretations is part of the reason why it’s lived such a long life in the spotlight, Rexroth says. It has managed to appeal to what people—specifically women—have wanted and fantasized about through different eras following its publication.

According to Looser, both film and stage adaptations have highlighted different aspects of the text for different reasons. During its first stage adaptations, for instance, the emphasis was often placed on Elizabeth’s character development. In fact, the most tense and climactic scene in these early performances was often her final confrontation with Lady Catherine De Bourgh, when Elizabeth asserts that she’s going to do what’s best for herself instead of cowering under Lady Catherine’s anger at her engagement to her nephew, Mr. Darcy.

Such scenes emphasize Elizabeth’s assertiveness and self-possession in the face of social pressure. Featuring this scene as the climax of the story is quite different from interpretations that focus on the suppressed erotic tension between Elizabeth and Darcy.

This doesn’t mean that adaptations prioritizing the romantic union didn’t soon follow. In 1935, Helen Jerome flipped the narrative on what Pride and Prejudice meant to a modern audience by casting a young, conventionally attractive man to play Mr. Darcy. Looser refers to this change as the beginning of “the rise of sexy Darcy,” a phenomenon that has continued in the nearly 100 years following this first casting choice.

In many ways, the intentional decision to make Mr. Darcy physically desirable on stage coincided with the rising popularity of the “romantic marriage”—a union founded on love and attraction rather than on status and societal expectations. Before this, Mr. Darcy’s being handsome was just a nice perk to Elizabeth, not a clear driving force for her feelings towards him.

Matthew Macfadyen (left) as Mr. Darcy in the 2005 film Pride and Prejudice. Some critics argue that the film over-dramatized the first proposal scene. (Photo: StudioCanal)

From loathing to love

This is not to say there’s no implication of attraction in the original novel, though. There’s something magnetic about Darcy and Elizabeth’s relationship from the very beginning, when they profess their distaste for each other as the reigning sentiment between them (though readers can see that Elizabeth really doesn’t seem to mind being insulted by Mr. Darcy until later in the novel). It’s a quintessential “enemies to lovers” narrative, Rexroth says.

In that way, the novel offers a hint of the unruly desires driving many creative decisions in most modern film adaptations—from the famous “wet shirt” scene in the 1995 BBC adaptation with Colin Firth and Jennifer Ehle, to what some critics argue is a highly over-dramatized first proposal scene staged in the rain in the 2005 Keira Knightly version. That sense of tension between Elizabeth and Darcy, unsaid but palpable, is a draw that has reeled in modern audiences to the point of obsession.

Rexroth suggests that part of the novel’s appeal hinges on what can and cannot be expressed in the text: “Because discussions of sex and desire are fairly repressed in the novel, emotional discourse has more free reign, which is often appealing to modern readers who experience a reverse set of tensions in modern life. Modern discourse, while often privileging a more open discussion of sex, often places tension on how and why we express emotion—especially in romantic relationships.”

Modern sexual liberation, especially through the eyes of women, has been an integral part of feminist movements. However, feminism also offers reminders that when the world still is governed by misogynistic ideas about sex—including women as the object and men as more emotionally unattached sexual partners—key aspects of what sex can mean from an anti-misogynist viewpoint are lost.

This, perhaps, is one reason that Pride and Prejudice is so appealing to women battling standards of sexuality centered around patriarchy, and who find themselves longing for something more—a “love ethic,” as author bell hooks called it.

However, is Pride and Prejudice really a perfect example of a "love ethic”? Rexroth also asks her classes to consider the pitfalls of how readers continue to fantasize about Pride and Prejudice, potentially seeing it as a model for modern romantic relationships.

Questions of true autonomy

While Elizabeth exercises her autonomy and free choice by rejecting not one but two men, standing up to Lady Catherine and overall just being a clever and witty heroine, she is still living within a larger society that privileges the status of her husband over her own and sees her value primarily in relation to the ways she circulates on the marriage market.

Jennifer Ehle (in wedding dress) and Colin Firth as Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Darcy in the 1995 BBC adaptation of Pride and Prejudice. For many fans, the "perfect ending" with the "perfect man" is part of the story's longstanding appeal. (Photo: BBC)

For that reason, women are never really autonomous, Rexroth says. How can they be, when Elizabeth’s decision to reject a man could potentially ruin her life and the lives of her sisters? Or when her sister Lydia’s decision to run away with Mr. Wickham nearly sends the entire family into ruin? What happens to Elizabeth in a world without Darcy?

This, according to Rexroth, is the danger of looking at Pride and Prejudice uncritically. Though readers and scholars may never know if Austen meant it to be a critical piece about the wider societal implications of the marriage market—although it can be inferred pretty strongly that she did mean it that way, Rexroth says—it does have startling implications towards modern relationships that we tend to find ourselves in.

“Modern discussions of love often focus on the individual, psychological aspects of relationships rather than the larger social networks that structure them,” Rexroth explains. “My students sometimes think that if they just work on themselves, go to the gym and find the right partner, everything will be okay—they’re not always thinking about how our larger social or political context might play a role in their love lives.”

The fantasy of Pride and Prejudice tends to reinforce this idea, she adds. It’s not that the world needs to change—the fantasy is that finding the right man will “change my world.” Such fantasies tend to treat patriarchy as a game women can win if they just play it the right way, Rexroth says. If a woman finds the right man or the right partner, that man will somehow provide the forms of social, economic or political autonomy that might otherwise be lacking in a woman’s life.

Such fantasies sidestep the question of what produces true autonomy—and therefore the capacity to fully participate in a romantic union, she adds.

So, is Pride and Prejudice the ultimate love story? Ardent fans might argue yes—a “perfect ending” with a “perfect man” is the quintessential love story, and who can blame readers for wanting those things? Happy endings are lovely.

Others, however, might still wish that Mr. Darcy had behaved in a more gentlemanlike manner.

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Are Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Darcy the greatest love story? CU Boulder’s Grace Rexroth weighs in.

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Colin Firth (left) and Jennifer Ehle as Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth Bennet in the 1995 BBC adaptation of "Pride and Prejudice." (Photo: BBC)

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