UC Riverside

Abolish Shakespeare offers an intersectional approach to the study of Shakespearean drama and the formation of Shakespeare studies drawing on abolition theory, critical race studies, and Marxist theory. In doing so, it emphasizes often neglected aspects of intersectional analysis to excavate the many facets and legacies of imagined white supremacy with regard to issues of gender, class, and religion. Imagined white supremacies are intertwined with the development of capitalism during its early formation, creating capitalism as a system not just with class structure at the root of its power, but one that clearly connects its alienation, exploitation, and oppression through these constructs of gender and race. Shakespeare and his contemporaries were products as well as producers of the society and culture in which they lived. One goal of this project is to advocate for the creation of a new knowledge commons and to envision a People’s Shakespeare – one that aligns with Marx’s description of self-clarification. A People’s Shakespeare would be driven by current people’s interests, wants, and needs rather than tied to a market for profit or an ideological system for imagined white supremacies.

My call to abolish Shakespeare studies is rooted in the way Shakespeare’s works have been used to perpetuate both whiteness as a pillar of power within capitalism as well as that imagined white supremacy that still survives to this day. This dissertation begins with an overview of abolition studies and praxis. Chapter One uncovers how Shakespeare's Othello erases the Ottoman Empire's presence in Cyprus to promote European imagined white supremacies within an early colonial capitalist framework. Chapter Two explores Shakespeare's use of "fairness" in As You Like It to reveal the formation of early modern whiteness tied to class distinctions. Chapter Three examines the construction of fairness and the effect it had upon sexual violence directed at both literary women and actual women within the period. Chapter Four introduces Christopher Marlowe's anti-capitalist perspective in Doctor Faustus to illustrate resistance against capitalism's allure and its complex interaction with anti-Blackness. The final chapter explores current modes of abolition taking place in Shakespeare studies.