Hans Herrera, a third-year double major in theatre studies and art history was one of only 12 students selected out of a nationwide call for entries for working group research paper reviews at the annual American Society of Theatre Research (ASTR) national conference in Denver, Colorado last month.
The topic of Herrera’s paper was an ecocritical look at Anton Chekhov’s work Uncle Vanya. Uncle Vanya was an extensive reworking of a play Checkhov wrote a decade earlier titled The Wood Demon. Herrera originally broached the topic as a paper in his spring 2025 theatre history course taught by Gibson Cima, associate professor and head of theatre studies in the NIU School of Theatre and Dance.
Cima encouraged Herrera to submit his paper it for consideration at ASTR.
Because Herrera was taking the theatre history course as an honors student, his paper was required to be at least ten pages. After his abstract was accepted by ASTR he was faced with an unusual next step. He needed to pare his paper down to the typical conference length of five to seven pages. His efforts involved doing even more research that had the opposite effect. The paper he submitted to ASTR was now 12 pages long. But, he says, “No one complained.”
“I’m very proud of Hans,” Cima said. “HIs paper rose to the top of a very crowded field.”
Cima has been a member of ASTR for 20 years and served as one of the program chairs of the conference along with Tarryn Chun of the University of Notre Dame and Megan Lewis of the University of Alabama at Birmingham.
Herrera was invited to attend the conference and participate in the working group review, but needed to find a way to pay for his travel and lodging. He worked to secure funding from the School of Theatre and Dance, the College of Visual and Performing Arts and received a grant from NIU’s Office of Student Engagement and Experiential Learning, all of which will be used to reimburse his expenses.
During the working group research paper reviews Herrera said that Megan Sanborn Jones, department chair and professor of Brigham Young University’s theatre and media arts program told the group that the works they were reviewing were “the best undergraduate research papers in the country.”
Herrera found the experience to be gratifying, “We got a chance to work with professors and students who are the cutting edge of theater research and to dig in on interesting topics,” he said. The students were divided into groups of three, read each other’s work and participated directly in the discussions of each of the papers.
Beyond the working groups, Herrera was able to experience the conference as a whole. His keen interest in the topics presented led him to taking “30 pages of notes and bringing home nine books of theater research.”
“It was gratifying to be exposed to that much research and to realize that I can go one-on-one with someone who has been studying these topics for forty years. I learned so much.”
Herrera says he realized early on in his time at NIU that he loved the research aspects of art. He began his studies as a studio art major and after taking an art history course decided to shift to his double major. He enjoys the well-rounded nature of NIU’s bachelor of arts in theatre studies and has taken full advantage. He has acted in theater productions, served as assistant director of a recent production of Accidental Death of An Anarchist, will serve as dramaturg for spring 2026’s production of Antígona Furiosa, and assistant direct The Comedy of Errors.
He directed the most recent Penguin Players production, will continue his work with Invictus Theatre Company in Irving Park, and he’s the coordinator of NIU’s Northern Ambassador program. He also served as co-emcee of the kickoff event for the university’s Forward: The Campaign for NIU.
He’ll have no problem staying busy.
