Mission

The mission of Shakespeare at Notre Dame is to establish Notre Dame nationally and internationally as a center for the study of Shakespeare in performance. The programs seeks to: (a) provide its undergraduates and graduates, the local community of South Bend and the wider region with opportunities to see Shakespeare productions, both professional and student, of the highest possible quality; (b) provide students with regular opportunities to perform Shakespeare both independent of and in collaboration with professional performers and directors, in order to provide students with a full range of experience of amateur and professional production in the course of the academic year; (c) educate students in the pleasures of watching Shakespeare (on stage and on film) so as to inculcate a life-time habit of seeing Shakespeare in performance; (d) provide courses at an undergraduate level and beyond, for students in all years of study and from the widest possible range of disciplines, to explore Shakespeare in performance; (e) support the full range of courses studying Shakespeare throughout the University; (f) provide at a master's and doctoral level, through MA/MFA and PhD courses, the opportunity for students to train both as scholar-critics and as theatre-workers through the study of Shakespeare in performance; and (g) support collection development in the University Library to support both doctoral work and advanced research by permanent and visiting Faculty.