A new ACTA survey, “The Unkindest Cut,” shows that’s among 52 top American colleges and universities, only four require their English majors to take even one course in Shakespeare. Of course, much of this is the Bard’s own fault. He is paying the price for being a dead white male at a time when the modern campus study of English runs to high interest in Samoan sword play and 17th century transgender pottery. ACTA is the American Council of Trustees and Alumni, and the four out-of-step campuses that still think a Shakespeare course should be of interest to those majoring in English are Harvard, U. Cal. Berkeley, Wellesley and the Naval Academy. ACTA reports: “When colleges do offer courses on Shakespeare, they are often just one of many choices. The “Early Literature to 1660” requirement at the University of Pennsylvania can be fulfilled with ‘Gender, Sexuality and Literature: Our Cyborgs, Our Selves.’ Other institutions require literature students to study ‘race, gender, sexuality, or ethnicity’ and ‘ethnic or non-Western literature,’ but not Shakespeare.”
