Bourus grant to bring American Shakespeare Co. to campus
March 2, 2007
KOKOMO, Ind.—Assistant Professor of English Terri Bourus, Ph.D., has received a third consecutive New Frontiers in the Arts grant from Indiana University. She’ll use the $40,000 to bring the American Shakespeare Company touring troupe to IU Kokomo for a 10-day residency in February 2008. The visiting actors will lead student workshops and perform
Henry V and
Taming of the Shrew.
Bourus’ grant proposal suggested a two-fold approach to teaching Shakespeare: using professional actors along with the new computer-based pedagogical tool XMAS, developed by Professor Peter Donaldson at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. “This program allows students/teachers to access performance and text simultaneously and to compare scenes and acting interpretations in exciting new ways, bringing the stage to life in the classroom,” Bourus said.
With her first New Frontiers grant, Bourus funded a similar weeklong residency in March 2006 by the Actors From the London Stage troupe. Following the AFTLS visit, enrollments in IU Kokomo’s English degree program tripled, and IU Kokomo students formed a Shakespeare Club. The club is sponsoring a spring break trip to the home of the American Shakespeare Center, Blackfriars Playhouse in Virginia.
Bourus’ second New Frontiers/ New Explorations grant funded her travel to Brisbane, Australia, in July 2006 to present research at the World Shakespeare Congress.
Bourus’ most recent grant was one of eight New Frontiers awards for 2007. Funded with a gift from Lilly Endowment, New Frontiers has enabled all eight IU campuses to expand their scholarship in the arts and humanities in ways that have provided new insights into the human condition and adventurous new directions in artistic and scholarly creativity.
New Frontiers focuses on a yearly theme of broad and topical interest providing intellectual focus for the program. The theme for this competition, “Technology and the Arts and Humanities,” included a diverse range of technologies from stone wheels to virtual reality.
For more information on English and theatre offerings at IU Kokomo, contact the Department of Humanities, www.iuk.edu/~kohman or (765) 455-9248.
