Updated October 2020
The next few months I am primarily committed to providing the very best learning experience for my students so other things are heading for the back burner for a while. Apart from teaching, including on our new MA Theatre and MA Storytelling, I am focusing on three main projects. There are two book chapters: one on Ernst Toller, a fascinating German playwright, and one on circus, wrestling and the avant-garde (I know: it is as wacky and experimental as it sounds!). I am also excitedly working on our new British Academy-funded project 'Health and Wellbeing in Professional Wrestling'; at this stage this involves talking to a lot of people, setting up a website (with amazing help from our in-house tech wizards at Loughborough University), and considering ethical practices.
My new book project, Muscular Modernisms, is going to be abandoned for a few months. I submitted the revised chapters, introduction and proposal to the publisher in September, so this gives me licence to sit back a little.
I am also enjoying exploring a few new areas for the future, including a new collaboration on the performativity of bodybuilding and some broader projects on health and wellbeing.
But, for now, this semester is about doing the very best job possible for our students. In this I am inspired by Maya Angelou's advice: "Try to be a rainbow in someone's cloud". May we be rainbows in people's clouds this term...
The next few months I am primarily committed to providing the very best learning experience for my students so other things are heading for the back burner for a while. Apart from teaching, including on our new MA Theatre and MA Storytelling, I am focusing on three main projects. There are two book chapters: one on Ernst Toller, a fascinating German playwright, and one on circus, wrestling and the avant-garde (I know: it is as wacky and experimental as it sounds!). I am also excitedly working on our new British Academy-funded project 'Health and Wellbeing in Professional Wrestling'; at this stage this involves talking to a lot of people, setting up a website (with amazing help from our in-house tech wizards at Loughborough University), and considering ethical practices.
My new book project, Muscular Modernisms, is going to be abandoned for a few months. I submitted the revised chapters, introduction and proposal to the publisher in September, so this gives me licence to sit back a little.
I am also enjoying exploring a few new areas for the future, including a new collaboration on the performativity of bodybuilding and some broader projects on health and wellbeing.
But, for now, this semester is about doing the very best job possible for our students. In this I am inspired by Maya Angelou's advice: "Try to be a rainbow in someone's cloud". May we be rainbows in people's clouds this term...
