Shakespeare and Community Performance [electronic resource] / by Katherine Steele Brokaw.

1. Community Shakespeare: Access, Adaptation, Activism -- 2. Public Shakespeare: Public Works (New York City) and Public Acts (UK) -- 3. Identity Shakespeare: L.A. Women's Shakespeare Company and Harlem Shakespeare Festival -- 4. Island Shakespeare: Hamlet in the Faroe Islands -- 5. Ecological Shakespeare: Shakespeare in Yosemite and the EarthShakes Alliance.

This book explores how productions of Shakespearean plays create meaning in specific communities, with special attention to issues of access, adaptation, and activism. Instead of focusing on large professional companies, it analyzes performances put on by community theatres and grassroots companies, and in applied drama projects. It looks at Shakespearean productions created by marginalized populations in Greater London, Harlem, and Los Angeles, a Hamlet staged in the remote Faroe Islands, and eco-theatre made in California's Yosemite National Park. The book investigates why different communities perform Shakespeare, and what challenges, opportunities, and triumphs accompany the processes of theatrical production for both the artists and the communities in which they are embedded. .