One of the aims of student-centered pedagogy is to diffuse authority in the classroom, so that the task of creating knowledge doesn't only reside in the instructor, but is mutually created by the epistemic community of the classroom. One of the ways I manifest my commitment to student-centered learning is through student-led classes.
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Hijab Bans and the Myth of Secular Equality
The hijab, or veil, is probably the most over-policed piece of clothing in the our modern era.
Review: Blackface by Ayanna Thompson
Some years ago, during a seminar at a Shakespeare Association of America (SAA) meeting in Atlanta, Ayanna Thompson proclaimed that Othello was “white property.” Commenting on the function of Othello’s Blackness in early modern culture as well as our own, Thompson signaled the importance of remembering that considerations of Othello and his racial identity must, … Continue reading Review: Blackface by Ayanna Thompson
Protected: MLA 2021 Paper for Session 507 Seventeenth-Century Race Thinking: Migration
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Caliphate is ISIS Fan-Fic
Caliphate, as both a product of War on Terror Culture and an active propagandist of it, deeply relies on the apparent truth of the tropes that the War on Terror have created for Islam and Muslims. It goes even further, however, by being ISIS fanfiction.
After Race Before Race: Appropriations
#RaceB4Race #ShakeRace #medievaltwitter This past weekend (Jan 17-18), the Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, held the third iteration of its RaceB4Race conference at Arizona State University. The theme of the conference was “Appropriations,” and as the program explained, "this RaceB4Race event focuses on how the term appropriation has recently signified in different ways … Continue reading After Race Before Race: Appropriations
Looking for Mercy in The Merchant of Venice
In the fall semester of 2018, my students at Harvey Mudd College participated in “The Quality of Mercy Project,” whose remit was to offer a collaborative but locally inflected vision of what The Merchant of Venice communicates to us and how we can, in turn, perform and transform this play given our particular, regional interests … Continue reading Looking for Mercy in The Merchant of Venice
The Fluid Mediterranean
About a month before I traveled to Malta, I received proofs of an article on an Early Modern English play called The Knight of Malta. The timing was quite fortuitous, reminding me not only of my research interests in the construction of racial difference via ideologies of religious difference, but also of my interest in … Continue reading The Fluid Mediterranean
Banning Persepolis is not how we defeat Islamophobia
Image copyright Marjane Satrapi and Pantheon Marjane Satrapi’s searing graphic memoir Persepolis continues to remain controversial and relevant over 15 years after its publication in North America. The memoir follows the childhood trauma endured by Satrapi as she came of age during the student--and then-- Islamic revolution in Iran in the 1970s. Satrapi depicts the … Continue reading Banning Persepolis is not how we defeat Islamophobia
Where was he radicalized? The fanaticism of A Noise Within’s Henry V
Where was he radicalized? Henry V at A Noise Within Photo credit A Noise Within We all know that Shakespeare’s Henry V is about war. While the play might feature a specious and spurious cause for war (as all good warmongers and their surrogates are wont to do), we are apt to forget that motivating … Continue reading Where was he radicalized? The fanaticism of A Noise Within’s Henry V
Ambereen Dadabhoy 