Kyna Hamill is the Director of the College of Arts & Sciences Core Curriculum and a Master Lecturer.
She specializes in Baroque theatricality, theatre and visual culture, and the commedia dell’arte tradition. She has published articles on teaching the commedia dell’arte, props, print culture, telescopes, and the monstrous in the 17th century as well as articles on staged violence. (See an interview here on using stage blood.) She edited They Fight: Classical to Contemporary Stage Fight Scenes, a collection of stage combat scenes, with special attention paid to diverse weaponry and scenes for women. Hamill’s research on the origins of the song “Jingle Bells” was covered in The Guardian in 2017. Her forthcoming book with Amsterdam University Press examines the visual legacy of the print artist Jacques Callot (1592-1635) in art, literature and theatre.
She specializes in Baroque theatricality, theatre and visual culture, and the commedia dell’arte tradition. She has published articles on teaching the commedia dell’arte, props, print culture, telescopes, and the monstrous in the 17th century as well as articles on staged violence. (See an interview here on using stage blood.) She edited They Fight: Classical to Contemporary Stage Fight Scenes, a collection of stage combat scenes, with special attention paid to diverse weaponry and scenes for women. Hamill’s research on the origins of the song “Jingle Bells” was covered in The Guardian in 2017. Her forthcoming book with Amsterdam University Press examines the visual legacy of the print artist Jacques Callot (1592-1635) in art, literature and theatre.
Read about some of her work in BU Today:
- February 2025, POV: “Why is Homer’s Odyssey Suddenly Everywhere?“
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August 2023, POV: “We Need to Keep Talking about Books, Not Ban Them.”
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June 2020, POV: “What Happens Next? Four Literary Classics for a Post–COVID-19 World”
- January 2020, POV: “What makes for a Satisfying Ending?”
- December 2016, Profile: “Unearthing the Truth about Jingle Bells”