Program Director
Courtney Lehmann, Ph.D.
Director, Pacific Humanities Scholars Program
Professor, English Department / Film Studies
Phone: 209.946.2609
Email
Faculty web page
Curriculum Vitae (PDF, 301 KB)
From her involvement as the director of the Humanities Center to her role as a faculty advisor for Calliope-the University's award-winning student literary magazine-Dr. Lehmann uses her spirit and passion to motivate students to new levels of thinking. Having received her Ph.D. in English at Indiana University and taught at Pacific since 1998, she understands the importance of scholarship in the humanities and of stretching one's mind to new horizons.
An aficionado of soccer and Shakespeare, Dr. Lehmann draws on her past experience as a member of four NCAA Division One National Championship teams at North Carolina, to bring enthusiasm, energy, and spunk to students in her Shakespeare classes and bring life to the characters, conflicts, and ideas that arise in the reading they explore:
"Freedom of interpretation is what I value most in the classroom... I firmly believe that there's no such thing as a wrong answer when engaging in literary exploration, so I am always encouraging students to take interpretive risks and venture outside of their personal 'comfort zones.'"
Dr. Lehmann has focused her own literary analysis on film adaptations of Shakespeare's works, and she recently had her fifth book on the topic published. She is frequently invited to present at Shakespeare conferences across the U.S. and abroad.
Based on her personal investment in social justice, Dr. Lehmann founded a charity to aid women and children in post-earthquake Haiti.