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Find out how we've been working on decolonising Shakespeare through the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust鈥檚 collections.
This National Centre for Academic and Cultural Exchange (NCACE) funded project built on the findings of Hopkins鈥檚 collaborative doctoral project with BCU and the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust (funded by Midlands4Cities), aiming to determine the best pathways to implementing positive change at the heart of Shakespeare鈥檚 cultural iconography: the museum of Shakespeare鈥檚 life and times in Stratford-upon-Avon. 聽
As a continuance of the partnership between BCU鈥檚 Institute of Media and English and the Trust, the funding enabled the production of a series of reports that translated the academic recommendations of the doctorate into positive and achievable actions with clear objectives, methods, and timelines. The reports reflect the urgency聽 indicated by the prior research to do three principal things: to recognise the role Shakespeare has been forced to play in establishing and upholding imperialistic narratives of聽 cultural supremacy; to purge the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust鈥檚 interpretative policies and brand narratives of Anglocentric and colonialist thought; to institute new communicative strategies to address societal inequities that are embedded in imperialism and associated with Shakespeare鈥檚 global cultural status.
The reports spotlight the Trust鈥檚 sub-collection of objects related to Bengali polymath Rabindranath Tagore, as the research highlighted the ways in which interpretation to date has prioritised Shakespeare鈥檚 value as a cultural figure over that of Tagore. The doctoral thesis noted the Trust鈥檚 scarce acknowledgement of Tagore鈥檚 astonishing body of literary work as well as the circumvention of the British atrocity in Jallianwala Bagh, Amritsar, in 1919 in its explanation for Tagore鈥檚 renunciation of his knighthood. 聽The action plan acknowledged the need for a dedicated project that is co-curated with Tagore experts and diasporic community stakeholders to celebrate and honour Tagore through the connections forged by the Trust鈥檚 collection, but without prioritising Shakespeare. The project would act as a case study for future decolonial work for the Trust and would mark the beginning of a new relationship between itself and the multicultural and global communities it serves.
The Trust鈥檚 eagerness to harness the momentum of the doctoral work indicates the first layer of impact that has been made through this work. A series of funding applications are now in progress to begin the next stage, the Tagore interpretation case study project, which will take the impact beyond the institutional level at the Trust and into its audiences. Those audiences will be enhanced by the community partnerships that are a crucial part of the project as they will ensure the work is truly representative and will help the Trust to engage with people who might previously have found its narratives exclusory and unwelcoming. Furthermore, a Memorandum of Understanding has now been signed between BCU and the Trust as a sign of the benefits and the potential of the relationship between HE and cultural organisations, to enable the translation of complex, and therefore contentious ideas like decolonisation into the public realm. The MoU will help the Trust reach key stakeholders through BCU鈥檚 extensive community connections, as well as ensure that the relationship is sustainable and supports the aims of the project as long-term rather than representing a fleeting engagement with the decolonial trend.
An audio recording of a presentation given by Hopkins at the NCACE Festival of Cultural Knowledge Exchange in October 2022 is available , and the short film produced by Hopkins and Prof. Vanessa Jackson about the Trust and its Tagore collection is available . Hopkins鈥檚 thesis is available on the BCU open access repository .