“Shakespeare and Science: Communication Across Disciplines”

Linda Shenk came to the Midwest from the University of Alaska Fairbanks, where she earned her master’s degree. She earned her PhD from the University of Minnesota Twin Cities. While her friends were excited to see her stay in the Midwest region, according to Shenk, “There’s a piece of me that’s home in Alaska that isn’t anywhere else.” In addition to Shenk’s focus on collaborative storytelling as a humanist, she developed a strong background in theatre through her studies and acts as the department’s Shakespearean scholar.

As a faculty member, Shenk knew she wanted to work as a humanist and apply the lessons from literature to build a direct connection to real-world issues. After a conversation at an interdisciplinary panel she helped arrange, Linda found an opportunity to get involved in sustainable city projects, which eventually led to her work with farmers and landowners, primarily women. From this initial meeting, she has been involved in grants that have enabled her to connect with many landowners. Linda is now a lead investigator on the Midwest regional team for Central Midwest COLEARN, where she collaborates with landowners, farmers, and tribal communities.

When asked how she came to utilize her classical background of literature and connect farmers to resources, she recounted a youth program in Des Moines that she started to encourage and foster children from under-resourced areas as leaders. One notable experience that started laying the framework for what her work would eventually lead to was bringing in her colleague’s simple computer simulation model which she noted “was like a storytelling device.” After her students played with the model and completed a few basic scenarios, she had them come back together and asked what the simulation got them thinking about. She was shocked to hear such enthusiasm as the youth had a collective agreement that it got them thinking about how they lead, what makes them special as leaders, and how to lead together for the betterment of the community. While the youth walked away from the activity with excitement and autonomy over their leadership abilities, Shenk was left with her own excitement, too, as the youth helped her understand her new identity as a scholar. “I realized the best way for us to engage communities in science is to leave space in the story for them to enter it and own it, too. That idea of how storytellers leave space is something I learned from literature and Shakespeare. A good storyteller not only tells a great story but also leaves space for us as readers to bring our own experiences and knowledge to fill in the gaps. That’s why Shakespeare never tells us why the two families in Romeo and Juliet are feuding.”

Shenk’s work reaches farmers and landowners by helping them establish conservation practices to revitalize and protect Iowa’s topsoil and cropland health. She understands the importance of allowing farmers to drive the story through their knowledge instead of disregarding their experience and telling them what to do. Through her work, many landowners have implemented cover crops, prairie strips, and other practices that reduce run-off and help improve water quality. These landowners have also done work that builds community among neighboring farmers—a part of taking care of the land that is also important.

Shenk’s work and advocacy has been instrumental to addressing science communication and she continues to encourage her students to do the same. By opening the dialogue and discourse between farmers and academia, real action is happening to mitigate the adverse consequences of agriculture and bridge the gap between two opposite communities. With Iowa State University’s roots in agriculture and position as a land-grant university, her work supports the university’s values.