Marcia Chatelain is an associate professor of history at Georgetown University. Dr. Chatelain’s research focuses on a wide range of issues in African American history, including African American migration, women and girls history, and race and food. Her first book, South Side Girls: Growing Up in the Great Migration, focuses on the experience of the great migration for young African American women—a group of people that scholars frequently fail to recognize or fully explore. In 2014, she gained national attention for creating the hashtag “FergusonSyllabus” on Twitter, and urging educators at all levels, and in all fields, to focus classroom discussion on the events surrounding Michael Brown’s shooting. The inspiration, she says, came from thinking of all the students in Ferguson who wouldn’t be able to go back to school as planned, and all of the empty desks and classrooms that would sit waiting.

This episode features an interview with Peter Holland, the McMeel Family Chair in Shakespeare Studies at the University of Notre Dame. Professor Holland is one of the leading critics of Shakespeare-in-performance, and has published on Shakespeare in a wide variety of formats, including scholarly journals, books, dictionary entries, and theater programs. For all of his scholarly acumen, listeners will quickly learn that Professor Holland is deeply committed to the idea that Shakespeare (and the humanities in general) should be fun, and shouldn’t shy away from the fact that they provide pleasure to readers and viewers alike.