Kevin Costner: America's Teacher examines the role of Costner in educational settings domestically and abroad. Costner's career over the past 35 years has seen ups and downs: his movies grossed 2 billion dollars in ticket sales worldwide and he has he won/been nominated for several Academy Awards but he also experienced critical and box office failures. Through the films in his oeuvre, Costner has been teaching audiences around the world about the United States--its history, people and culture. Some viewers and scholars recognize this as positive, others as problematic. This book serves as a place for teachers and scholars to explore ways in which Costner may be tapped for research and teaching purposes at all levels of education. It is organized around three large themes: Costner's baseball films and their connection to Americana; Costner's films through the more critical lenses of gender and new western scholarship; and Costner's teaching of teachers, the pedagogical possibilities of his work.
Edward Janak is professor and department chair of educational studies at the University of Toledo. Ludovic A. Sourdot is professor of teacher education at Texas Woman's University.
Contents Foreword Andrew Grunzke Introduction Ludovic A. Sourdot and Edward Janak Part I: Kevin Costner and America's Game Chapter One: Candlesticks Make a Nice Gift: The Baseball Films of Kevin Costner Cathy Leogrande Chapter Two: Heaven or Iowa? Field of Dreams and Public Understanding of America's Pastime Bradley Hart and Dennis Hart Part II: Kevin Costner and Sex, Gender, and the New West Chapter Three: Black Women's Lives Matter: Revisiting The Bodyguard Thirty Years Later Tatiana Prorokova-Konrad Chapter Four: Performing the Rugged Patriarch: Yellowstone's Commemoration of the American Monomyth Chandra Maldonado and Ashley A. Mattheis Chapter Five: "This is America. We Don't Share Land Here." Kevin Costner, Taylor Sheridan, and Remediating New/Post-West(ern) Scholarship in Yellowstone Stefan Rabitsch and Pawel Pyrka Part III: The Pedagogical Possibilities of Kevin Costner Chapter Six: Kevin Costner the Wise Teacher: Thirteen Days and Four Lessons from the Cuban Missile Crisis William Gombash Chapter Seven: Intentional Focus on Integrated STEM: Was Costner the Original STEM Influencer? Andrea Burrows, Michelle Chamberlain, and Mike Borowczak Chapter Eight: Resilience and Asset Framing: The Lessons of McFarland, USA Ludovic A. Sourdot and Edward Janak Afterword: "Playing the Hand You've Been Dealt": Lessons in Leadership the Post-COVID Educational Frontier Jerry Ausburn and Edward Janak Index About the Contributors
