Matthew Sergi

Matthew Sergi, an Associate Professor of English, specializes in medieval English drama, performance, and play. His first monograph, Practical Cues and Social Spectacle in the Chester Plays (U Chicago Press, 2020), reveals new evidence for early staging, design, and acting by combing through the extant texts of twenty-five short plays – based on reimagined (and sometimes very amusingly embellished) Bible stories – that hundreds of craftsmen and boys (and women?) produced on mobile wagon stages in the busiest streets of fifteenth- and sixteenth-century Chester. Practical Cues received an Honourable Mention for the Medieval and Renaissance Drama Society (MRDS)’s 2021 David Bevington Award for Best New Book in Early Drama Studies; for his shorter research publications, Matt has won the MRDS 2016 Martin Stevens Award for Best New Essay in Early Drama Studies and the MRDS 2012 Barbara Palmer Award for Best New Essay in Early Drama Archival Research. Matt’s research has taken form as live plays, too, bringing premodern English dramatic texts into present-day performances. His undergraduate courses at the U of T, which won the campus-wide Early Career Teaching Award in 2019, cover English drama before 1485 (medieval drama); English drama between 1485 and 1603 (medieval and early modern drama); English literature before 1660; and the history of the English language.

Office Hours

Office Hours are only held on days when classes are in session, but at varying times. Please see premodernity.net for current hours.

Publications

Books

Practical Cues and Social Spectacle in the Chester Plays (University of Chicago Press, 2020). (Honorable Mention: MRDS Bevington Award).

Articles and Chapters

“Un-Dating the Chester Plays: A Critical Reassessment of Mills, Clopper, and MS Peniarth 399.” In Early British Drama in Manuscript, eds. Tamara Atkin and Laura Estill (Turnhout, Belgium: Brepols Press, 2019): 71-102.

“Our Subject Is Each Other: Teaching HEL to ESL, EFL, and Non-Standard English Speakers.” In The History of the English Language: Pedagogical Practices for College and University Classrooms, eds. Mary Hayes and Allison Burkette (Oxford University Press, 2017).

“Beyond Theatrical Marketing: Play Banns in the Records of Kent, Sussex, and Lincolnshire.” Medieval English Theatre 36 (2014): 3-23. (Winner, MRDS Stevens Award).

“Dice at Chester’s Passion.” In The Chester Cycle in Context, 1555-1575: Religion, Drama, and the Impact of Change, eds. Ostovich, Klausner, and Dell (Ashgate, 2012): 65-78.

"Staging Food and Drink at Chester." In Medieval English Theatre 31 (2011 for 2009), 89-136. "Dice at Chester's Passion." In The Chester Cycle in Context, 1555-1575: Religion, Drama, and the Impact of Change, eds. Ostovich, Klausner, and Dell (Ashgate, 2012): 65-78.

"Festive Piety: Staging Food and Drink at Chester." In Medieval English Theatre 31 (2011 for 2009), 89-136. (Winner, MRDS Palmer Award).