Personally Speaking presentation to take a new look at Shakespeare

In a Feb. 4 Personally Speaking event, English professor Jennifer Munroe will talk about how to better understand the world of William Shakespeare’s plays and the relationships depicted among the men, women, animals and plants of the playwright’s imaginings.

Her book, “Shakespeare and Ecofeminist Theory,” looks at both representations of “environment” that might provide insight into these relationships in early modern English history, especially those related to gender identity and how people’s understanding of their relationship to “environment” 400 years ago might help to redress today’s environmental crises.

Munroe will lead the conversation about her book at UNC Charlotte Center City. Doors will open at 6 p.m. Tuesday, Feb. 4, for a reception, and the program will begin at 7 p.m. A dessert reception and book signing will follow the author’s presentation.

The event is open to the public without charge, but registration is required. Information about parking will be emailed to registrants prior to the event.

This marks the 10th season in which UNC Charlotte’s College of Liberal Arts & Sciences, in partnership with J. Murrey Atkins Library and UNC Charlotte Center City, has presented free public conversations between the community and its published scholars about their research and their books.

Munroe, a professor of English, is a founding member of EMROC (Early Modern Recipes Online Collective), which is developing a public-access database of transcribed early modern manuscript recipes. She is working on an ecofeminist literary history of science titled, “Mothers of Science: Women, Nature and Writing in Early Modern England.”

She co-wrote “Shakespeare and Ecofeminist Theory” with Rebecca Laroche who teaches Shakespeare, early modern women’s writing and environmental humanities at the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs.